Ever
since I began this project I've had people emailing me asking me to
include all the other studios around the UK. Well, sorry, but I
am trying to fit work, home and some sort of social life into my
time. However, tucked away at the end of my 'history of old ITV
studios in London' page was a section that began as a summary of what
happened to the old ITV studios around the rest of the country.
It then expanded a bit to include a few other studios so I decided it
was probably about time it was given its own page. This is it.

Incidentally
- I'm only including TV production studios that make a variety of
programmes for network transmission on UK channels - not those built
for a specific soap (eg Doctors)
or regional news studios. I'm also covering 4-waller (film)
studios making TV drama.

Please
don't ask me why I'm not including the history of all the various
Southern/Central/Border TV studios or whatever your particular
interest is. I'm simply summarising here what we have now and
have had for the past four or five years in the UK. If you want
to create your own history of regional studios - feel free and I'll
happily give your site a link!

Since
the mid 1990s most production studios around the country owned by
Carlton and Granada - eventually becoming 'ITV plc' - have been sold
off or closed down. These were in Bristol (HTV West), Cardiff
(HTV Wales), Birmingham (Central), Newcastle (Tyne Tees), Carlisle
(Border), Plymouth (Westcountry), Maidstone (TVS), Nottingham
(Central), Norwich (Anglia), Southampton (Meridian), Albert Dock
Liverpool (Granada) and Gillingham (TVS).

Thanks
to Matthew Hadley for this image of the TVS Television Theatre

Why
Gillingham???

All
right, it closed well before the mid 1990s so it shouldn't be
included in the list anyway. I'm just intrigued by an ITV
production studio being built in a modestly sized town not previously
or since particularly noted for its cultural output. With
apologies to the good people of Gillingham, obviously.

The
studio in Gillingham had originally been a 1931 Plaza cinema.
It was quickly converted to a studio as the new Maidstone Studios
would not be ready in time for TVS to begin broadcasting to the new
South East ITV region on 1st January 1982. They called it the
'TVS Television Theatre'. It had a useable floor area of about
5,400 sq ft, permanent audience seating for 260 and was equipped with
five Marconi Mk IXB cameras.

The
original intention had been to sell it off as soon as Maidstone was
open but TVS hung onto it for a while, making programmes such as
regional afternoon magazine Not for Women Only and from 1986 The
Television Show, which was broadcast live from here on Sunday
evenings across the ITV network.

Oddly,
the show that kept the studio open wasMuppets
spin-off Fraggle Rock, which ran from 1983-1987.
Once this ended the studio was hardly used so it was put up for sale
early in 1988 and was purchased by Network One TV in June 1989.
(This company also took over the Greenwood in 1990.) Masterchef
was made here then, plus a handful of other shows. It closed as
a studio in July 1991 and following a brief spell as a Quasar laser
gaming centre (that's more like it!) it lay empty for several years
and was demolished in 2001.

The
Gillingham studio as it appeared in an article in a local
newspaper. Thanks to Paul Burton for sending me this.

Outside
London, apart from local news studios only The Manchester Studios
(Granada) and The Leeds Studios (Yorkshire) are still owned by
ITV. More on them later. However, it's not all bad news...

The
ex ITV studios in Maidstone, Cardiff and Norwich have fortunately
survived as independent facilities...

Maidstone
Studios. The large green building is studio 5.

with
thanks to the Maidstone Studios website

Maidstone
Studios
were built by TVS in 1982/83. In 1993 Meridian Broadcasting
took over the south-east ITV franchise but not these
studios. TVS intended to continue operating as an
independent production company but soon after were bought up by
International Family Entertainment Inc who ran The Family
Channel. Meridian continued to rent a news studio from the new
owner and continue to do so today - a small area of the building is
still operated by ITV.

After
a while the building became the HQ for Flextech, the satellite
broadcaster, and a number of channels were played out from here for a
few years. The studios themselves though had little
use. There is still an impressive satellite dish 'farm' on the
site, although few are now being used for transmission.

In
2001 the studios were purchased by a group of businessmen and
experienced television producers whose aim was To
be a self-sustaining studio and media production centre supporting
creative development with local, national and worldwide potential in
the new millennium and digital era.
In other words, to attract programme makers away from their usual
studios in London.

The
studios keep relatively busy and amongst other shows have
specialised in children's programmes including Ministry
of Mayhem, Basil Brush,
Escape From Scorpion Island and Art Attack.
The four original studios are 1 - 2,000 sq ft; 2 - 6,000 sq ft; 3 -
500 sq ft and 4 - 250 sq ft. In 2005 they opened a new 11,400
sq ft stage - 'studio 5' - a useful large space with which they hoped
to attract big light entertainment programmes. It is licensed
for an audience of no less than 2,400 - although clearly this is
standing room only! Nevertheless, there is room for an
impressively large seated audience.

Studio
2 is a very useful space being approximately the same size as
Riverside's studio 1, which is sadly no more. It is 81 x 58ft
within firelanes and has fully equipped galleries and a saturated
lighting rig with 116 motorised bars. With the closure of TV
Centre, Teddington, Riverside and Wimbledon it is understandably much
busier now than it has been for many years. Catchphrase
has been a typical booking.

Maidstone
studio 2.

Studio
5 is 40m x 24m or 133 x 80 metric feet. within firelanes. It
was originally constructed relatively cheaply but over the following
years had some much needed money spent on it. At first, it did
not have its own production galleries but borrowed those of the other
studios as and when required. A dedicated gallery suite was
opened early in 2007, a short walk across in the main building.

The
studio opened with a very basic lighting grid but is now partly
equipped with motorised trusses. These are a great improvement
but are not as flexible as the bars or monopoles to be found in other
large studios. For example, it is not possible to replace a
blown bulb or rerig a lamp without the use of a scissor lift mobile
hoist once the studio set is in place.

Bookings
for studio 5 in the past few years have included the first series of Duel,
Dale's Supermarket Sweep, 1 vs 100 and the
BBC's Making Your Mind Up -
which became newsworthy for all the wrong reasons when Terry Wogan
announced the incorrect winner in 2007. Productions during 2010
included ITV1's Easter Special gameshow The Door (which I had
the experience of lighting), Got To Dance for Sky1 and Five's
talent contest Don't Stop Believing. Bookings in 2011
included ITV1's dating gameshow Take Me Outwhich
returned in 2012, 2013 and 2014. When TV Centre closed, studio
5 became the regular home of Later With Joolsand
the Hootenanny.

I
mentioned above that The Door was a bit of an
experience. Certainly, I have never worked before or since in
such an extraordinary whiff caused by rotting vegetables, animal and
fish carcasses, and with such an alarming range of creatures
including snakes, rats, spiders, scorpions and tens of thousands of
flies. Some of the above escaped at one time or other but
most, I believe, were recaptured. Not the flies,
obviously. The studio management were extraordinarily relaxed
about all this going on in their studio. Good for them. I
can think of one or two managers in other studios who would have had
a small but spectacular explosive fit.

The
management of Maidstone is keen to see the studios succeed and
continue to invest in them. They deserve success and with the
demand for studios now being so great they will no doubt attract more work.

The
old HTVWalesmain
production studio (7,500 sq ft) at Culverhouse Cross opened in 1984
and in its latter years until its closure was operated by NEP Cymru
as as Studio
1.

The
television centre built for HTV Wales at Culverhouse Cross, just
outside Cardiff. The masts in the background are at Wenvoe -
the main transmitter for South Wales.

photo
by Christopher Ware

The
main studio here was closed by ITV but operated independently asStudio
1 Facilitiesfrom
the spring of 1993 until the autumn of 2006. This very small
company ran the studio within the huge ex-HTV site on the outskirts
of Cardiff. They mostly made programmes for S4C but the studio
was also occasionally used for some of the Christopher Eccleston Dr
Who episodes as a film stage. In
2005 I had the pleasure of lighting an Aled Jones music special here
which went out on Christmas Day (in fact I'm rather pleased to say I
won a Welsh Bafta doing it.) I lit a chat show with Rob Brydon
and the cast of Little Britain for BBC3 later in 2005 and
returned in 2009 for a series with opera and West End musical singer,
Shan Cothi.

The
studio had a most unusual lighting grid - with monopoles and a
complicated system of cross-over tracks where scopes had to be
'parked up' (don't ask). It was also somewhat restricted by a
number of enormous ventilation tubes that were distributed across the grid.

The
ex-HTV site was for a while owned by media company UBM but apart
from studio 1 and regional ITV programming in studio 2 the
buildings were mostly empty. In 2006 the whole site was bought
back by ITV plc to be developed as a media centre and an expanded
base for ITV Wales. Studio 1 had seen very little investment
for many years and attracted less and less work. Eventually,
towards the end of 2006, Studio 1 Facilities Ltd. ceased operation.

The
studio was then let on a seven year lease to Barcud Derwen, the
Welsh TV facilities company. The site was run by Barcud's HD OB
management arm, Omni TV, and was renamed 'Omni
Studio'.
It continued to be used for various
entertainment series and gameshows, mostly for S4C and was booked by
the BBC's Mastermind. It was also used as a 4-waller for
shooting commercials and as a rehearsal space for rock tours.
The studio was sometimes booked by local production company
Presentable (now part of Zodiak Media) for their Late Night Poker programmes,
which they make for Channel 4.

Sadly,
in June 2010 Barcud Derwen went into administration. Their
base in North Wales was closed down but the Omni division of the
company, consisting mostly of an HD OB scanner and the lease on this
studio, was purchased by US company NEP Broadcasting to become NEP
Cymru. They returned to the old name of 'Studio 1'.

No
technical facilities remained and all the lights were sold off but
the studio operated very well as a 4-waller using an OB unit for
facilities as and when required. The dimmers and telescopes
remained and the old prop room was used as a lighting gallery, which
actually worked better than before since it was closer to the studio
floor. The studio continued to be used for S4C's music,
entertainment and quiz shows.

From
2008 Studio 1 was the home of popular BBC Four/BBC Two quiz show Only
Connectwith
Victoria Coren-Mitchell. There were an impressive 116 episodes
made here. However, late in 2013 a series was recorded in the
BBC's drama studios at Roath Lock and in 2014 it was made in the
Enfys studio in Cardiff.

In
August 2013 ITV announced that they would be leaving Culverhouse
Cross and establishing a base for local news in Cardiff Bay next to
the National Assembly by June 2014. The old HTV studio centre
was to be demolished and the site used for housing. However,
ITV's plans to redevelop the site were opposed by local residents and
by those companies currently renting space in the building.
There were about 35 media-related businesses based on the site.
Planning permission was refused so the studio remained open for the
time being. The plans were revised and resubmitted to the Vale
of Glamorgan council who announced in March 2014 that permission had
been granted.

The
studio is now closed but I have yet to establish what the last
programme made here was - and when. Can you help??

Meanwhile
- 'from Norwich'
as the quiz of the week used to proudly boast - there was a bit of
good news. The old Anglia studio centre in Magdalen Street was
purchased by Norfolk County Council in 2006 and over £1m was
spent on upgrading the facilities. It is was initially marketed
as the East of England Production Innovation Centre (EPIC) but is now
known simply as Epic
Studios.

I
was informed that... it
will function as a "Creative Industries Enterprise
Hub". In that role it will have three main functions: to
provide first class production and post production facilities to
local, regional and national production companies and broadcasters;
to support new or existing production and production related
businesses, particularly by offering production space on 'easy in'
and 'easy out' terms to companies and start-ups; and to help produce
the creatives of the future by providing training and education
facilities which will be used for related courses by local H.E.
colleges and other providers.Phew! You
might have guessed that the previous words were not mine but those of
Mark Wells, its centre director.

studio
1 soon after its relaunch

with
thanks to the EPIC website

studio
1 in its current form as a music performance venue

with
thanks to Epic Studios

The
main studio 1 - is 80 x 60ft within firelanes and about 6,000 sq ft
overall. It was refurbished following a £1.5m grant and is
fully HD. Six Sony HDC-1500 cameras were purchased for the main
studio and all three studios became fully HD capable in September
2008. Of the two small studios, one was originally marketed as
a 'discussion studio' - equipped with four JVC HD cameras and the
other as a 'virtual' studio. This also has four JVC cameras -
an Orad Smart Set system was installed in April 2008.

The
main studio was mostly used initially as a 4-waller for shooting
drama, commercials etc but Question Time has used the studio's
facilities. In June 2010 an edition of Frank Skinner's
Opinionated was recorded in this studio. The show returned
in 2011.

Disappoiningly,
very few programmes for the main broadcast channels have ever been
made in these studios. Probably their relatively remote
location is the reason. However, the centre has now found its
niche as a venue for music performance - the added value of being
able to televise concerts with the studio's HD kit and either stream
onto the Internet or record DVDs of live concerts is an added bonus.

It
is perhaps worth pointing out that these studios are not the
original Anglia House centre that opened in the 1950s. That is
still located on Prince of Wales Road. That centre had four
studios which inexplicably weren't enough for this small company so
in the 1990s they expanded and took over a property in Magdalen
Street, moving their news operation there. In 2006 they moved
the local news back to Anglia House and sold the newer studios to the
local council. It is these that are now the 'Epic' centre.
I hope you're following all this.

Quite
why Anglia needed so many studios (they even took over an old post
office building next to the original studios) is a mystery yet to be
solved. As far as network multicamera shows go all I can
remember coming from Anglia over the past 50 years is Sale of the Century,
Gambit, Tales of the Unexpected - er - The Time The Place
and of course Trisha. Of course there have been a few
single camera dramas too like The Chief so maybe that's why
they needed studio space.

Anyway,
the local ITV news is now rattling round in the otherwise deserted
original studio centre. I understand the old studio 1 was
divided into two news studios when the department returned in 2006.

Central
Studios, Lenton Lane, Nottingham - 1983-2004

These
studios were in some people's opinion the best that were ever built
in the UK. They certainly drew upon the wide experience gained
in other studio centres and incorporated many well-designed
features. They still exist (hence their inclusion here) -
although no longer as a working studio centre. They are part of
the University of Nottingham who do still offer the largest studio as
a 4-waller, although to my knowledge it is very seldom used to make a
multicamera TV show.

The
studios were built to a high specification and were much loved by
those who worked there. They began operation in the autumn of
1983. As well as local news studios there were three main
production studios - studio 6 (72 x 46ft), studio 7 (89 x 88ft) and
studio 8 (89 x 79ft). They had motorised lighting bars and
studio 7 had a groundrow trench in the floor for lighting 'infinity'
cycloramas. It's worth pointing out that both 7 and 8 are much
larger studios than the norm at, say TLS or TV Centre. About
the same length as most studios but very usefully nearly 20 feet
wider. There was also a music studio that later became studio
11 (53 x 40ft gross) and studio 8X (43 x 35ft gross) that was
converted from part of the scenery store in 2001.

At
first they were very busy making local and networked programmes but
Central was a very different company from ATV and the big spectacular
entertainment shows that made ATV famous worldwide were simply not
made any more. By 1990 drama too was no longer shot in TV
studios but on location or in film stages. However, some
sitcoms such as The Upper Hand
and Barbara
were made here.

Lenton
Lane particularly became known for its gameshows such as Blockbusters,
Catchphrase, Family Fortunes, The Price is Right, Supermarket Sweep and Bullseye.Celebrity
Squares was revived here too between
1993 and 1996. Matthew Hadley has kindly pointed out some other shows
- The Midas Touch with Bradley Walsh ('95-'96),
The Freddy Starr Show('94-'98),
Crazy Cottage ('96-'98),
Mad For It ('98-'00), Body Heat ('94-'96) and
Pot of Gold - a
talent show fronted by Des O'Connor between 1993 and 1995.

In
1994 the studios became part of Carlton's empire - a company that
apparently had little interest in making programmes themselves and
running a studio centre was not something they particularly wanted or needed.

By
2001 the studio utilisation was relatively low but a lifeline came
when Crossroads
was recommissioned after many years. All the production studios
except 7 were used for this show with high quality permanent sets -
parts of the exterior of the centre becoming the famous motel.
Unfortunately, that show was axed in 2003.

The
writing was on the wall and the owners of ITV were ruthless in their
disposal of what to them seemed surplus property. The site was
sold to Nottingham University, the deal being completed in March
2005. The last shows to be made here in 2004 were Doctors
and Nurses - a sitcom for BBC1 by Phil
Hammond, starring Ade Edmonson and David Mitchell and Beat
The Nation, a quiz for C4 with Graeme
Garden and Tim Brooke-Taylor.

Incidentally,
the motorised lighting bars or 'boats' from studio 8 were purchased
by AFM (now Panalux) for possible installation in one of the two TV
studios at Pinewood. However, perhaps following a lukewarm
response by various lighting directors at the prospect, this never
happened. (Most LDs prefer monopoles, which is the system in
use at Pinewood.) The current whereabouts of the studio 8
hoists is unknown.

Most
of the studios are now lecture rooms or used for storage but
apparently studios 6 and 7 still exist as 4-wallers and can be hired
- but seldom are by TV companies. I'm told that the galleries
for studio 7 are still there but all the equipment and monitors have
been removed. The lighting bars still exist, with some lights
on them but what condition they are in is unknown. Studio 7 is
used as an exam hall and occasionally for conferences but has been
used by Question Time on
several occasions.
Holes have been knocked through the walls for cabling through to an
OB scanner and/or generator.

I
believe the studio has been used occasionally for filming dramas but
TV bookings are very rare. Barry Wilson has kindly written to
me - he worked on an edition of The Big Question with Nicky
Campbell in February 2008. Like Question Time, this show
travels all round the country with its own OB unit and lighting
rig. It is likely frankly that the cost of paying for travel
and accommodation for a whole crew, plus hiring all the necessary
technical facilities would outweigh any other advantages of making a
TV series here now rather than in an established studio elsewhere.

studio
6 in September 2010

photo
thanks to Rich Holleworth

studio
7 in September 2010

photo
thanks to Rich Holleworth

Currentregional
ITV studios

Please
note that I am not attempting to cover the history of ITV's regional
studios here. That's a job for someone else to do. I am
of course aware that all over the country, studios have been closed
or reduced in capability much to the anger of the people who live
near them.

This
section covers those ITV studios still in use now or until very
recently, which is quite a contrast to the number there were when ITV
began in the 1950s.

The
famous studios in Quay Street during the good old days. From
the year 2000 known to men and women in suits as '3sixtymedia' or
sometimes 'The Manchester Studios' but to the rest of the human race
still as Granada Studios. The transmitter tower by the way was
purely for decoration. And why not?

The
Granada TV sign and the tower were removed by ITV during 2010 'for
health and safety reasons.' Of course.

image
thanks to Wikipedia

3sixtymedia/The
Manchester Studios (Granada)(1956 - 2013)

The
first purpose-built television studios to open in the UK were
Granada's in Manchester. The BBC would have got there first
with TV Centre but due to finance problems, construction was put on
hold for a few years during the Centre's development. Granada
started broadcasting from its new studios in Quay Street on 3rd May
1956. The company was awarded the franchise eighteen months
before going on air. They were thus able to take their time
designing and building a centre that fully met their needs. The
two storey building seen in the foreground above was the first to be
built, with the distinctive Granada House added later.

Sidney
Bernstein, the owner of the company, decided to name the studios in
even numbers only so it would appear that he had twice as many.
Studios 2 and 4 were the first to open with 6, 8 and 12 following in order.

Studio
2 was in use until early 2013 as the home of Granada Reports
- the regional news - as well as some sport and political programmes
and a late night magazine show. Studio 4 was originally a small
continuity studio which was only in use for a few years, although it
famously hosted the first TV appearance of The Beatles in 1962.
It was later converted to become the main reception area. There
was no studio 10 - that was the Chelsea Palace in London. The
last studio - 12 - opened in 1958 and until Rediffusion's studio 5
opened in 1960 was the largest in the UK.

Studios
8 and 12 were roughly the same width with 8 being about two-thirds
the length of 12. When originally built, one end of this studio
had an area with a low ceiling (8ft 8ins) behind the cyc track.
This brought the total length of the studio floor to the same as
studio 12. Quite what this low-ceilinged space was intended for
is a bit of a mystery - much too restricted to contain an audience
and too low to put any sets in, let alone a lighting rig. It
would have been useful to store props I suppose but at some point
someone must have wondered what the point of keeping it was.
The space was walled off and turned into rooms - editing suites I
believe. Oddly, when I lit a show in studio 8 in 2004, the
studio plan I was given indicated that this area of the studio still
existed (that's how I know the height of the ceiling!).

When
they opened, the studios were of course equipped with black and
white cameras but most of the studios were colourised around
1969. Chris Whitehead has written with an interesting
story. It seems that Marconi were given the contract to
refurbish studios 2, 4, 6 and 12. Studio 8 was mothballed for a
few years before being equipped with EMI 2005s in the mid '70s.
Studio 4 was the first to be fitted out - with Marconi Mk VIIs.
However, these were so disliked by cameramen and engineers that the
subsequent studios were equipped with EMI 2001s - even though Marconi
still carried out the work of upgrading the galleries and other
equipment. They must have been pretty cheesed off at having to
supply cameras made by their arch-rival.

The
studios were well designed for their day but a few shortcomings not
surprisingly became clear over the subsequent decades. For
example, only one scene dock door for each studio opening onto a
relatively small internal scenery/props storage area. The
shapes and sizes may also not have turned out to be ideal for the
range of shows that ended up being made in them. Curiously,
despite decades of discovering what worked well and what worked less
well, the managers of ITV North decided to copy what they had here
almost exactly when they were involved in planning the new studios at
MediaCity, rather than improve on them. In fact, in some
respects the MediaCity studios are less efficient and easy to work in
than these 1950s studios, designed when people were still discovering
how best to make TV shows. (Please note - ITV had more
influence in the design of the MediaCity studios than the BBC - who
were not involved at all, despite what most people assume.)

In
October 2000, a big change came to the way the business was
run. These studios and the BBC's in Oxford Road were struggling
to attract sufficient work and contain their costs. The two
organisations decided to create a new company - 3sixtymedia - that
would consolidate their Manchester operation at Granada's
studios. The board of 3sixtymedia was set up with three
directors from Granada and two from the BBC with voting rights split
80:20 in favour of Granada. A number of redundancies were made
in both companies. As part of the deal, both ITV and the BBC
were forbidden from operating any other studios in competition with
the new company in the Manchester area. Thus, the BBC's studio
A was closed and its technical equipment sold off or scrapped.

3sixtymedia
then offered the following TV studios:

studio
6 - 4,425 sq ft approx (68 x 52 metric feet within firelanes) - used
in latter years for the Jeremy Kyle Show,
TheHeaven and Earth Show and
The Royle Family.

studio
12 - 7,850 sq ft approx (98 x 70 metric feet within firelanes) -
used latterly for Stars in Their
Eyes, The Price is Right and Soapstar
Superstar. It was also used
for the BBC's lottery show Who Dares Wins in 2011 - one of the
last shows to use the studio and one which I had the pleasure of
lighting. The firelanes in this studio were only about 3 feet
wide which made the studio feel narrower than similar studios - but
it was the 'normal' 70 metric feet wide and much longer than most
equivalent studios. Interestingly, studio HQ2 at MediaCity
which copied this one has the walls the same size but the firelanes
are 4ft rather than 3ft. Thus the working area of that studio
is only 68 ft wide - a surprisingly significant limitation.

From
2005 to 2011 the old BBC studio A was operated by 3sixtymedia and
offered for hire, albeit as a 4-waller. 3sixtymedia also had
some warehouse buildings on or near the main Quay Street site. These
were not equipped as television studios but some had TV lino or resin
floors. These other spaces were as follows:

Compared
with most London based studios, none of these were particularly busy
with some remaining empty for many weeks of the year. The
exception was perhaps studio 6, with the Jeremy Kyle Show a
popular fixture of the ITV daytime schedule. However, Countdown
moved to Manchester in June 2009, providing a much-needed regular
occupant of studio 8. University Challenge was
the other user of this studio. All three shows now share studio
HQ4 at MediaCity, which is approximately the same size as studio 8.

I
should of course mention that Coronation Street was made here
from 1960-2013 - although not in the latter years in any of the
studios mentioned above. The popular soap had two dedicated
studios to the side of the Quay Street site - stage 1 and stage 2 -
along with the exterior set of the Street. Stage 2 was
previously occupied by the Baker Street set used by the Jeremy Brett Sherlock
Holmes series ('84-'94), then roofed over and enclosed to become
part of the Granada Studios Tour, which ran from 1988-1999.

Corrie
did not start in stage 1 however. For many years it used the
normal studios - studio 6 mostly. There were two episodes a
week - in the early days the Friday one was transmitted live and the
following Wednesday's show was recorded straight afterwards.
Quite an achievement to rehearse and then perform an hour's material
in one day! Between 1960 and 1968 there was no outdoor set -
exteriors were shot in the studio. A semi-permanent set was
begun in 1968, initially made of wood, then developed using brick
façades and back gardens during the 1970s. The permanent
outdoor set was begun in 1982, extended in 1989 and then further in
1999. A new larger exterior set was built in Salford during 2013.

In
fact, stage 1 was not purpose-built for Corrie. Andy
Stagles has informed me that it was originally used for live indoor
bowling! It was lit with a load of Blondes and Redheads and the
grid was very high. When Corrie moved in a new grid had
to be suspended just above the sets and extension cables had to link
the lights with the sockets way up in the roof.

When
stage 2 was converted, the producer at that time said that it would
only be used for single-camera shooting so no galleries were
required. A short time later galleries were installed due to
the unexpectedly (ahem) slower speed of single camera working.

The
threat of closure was hanging over the Quay Street studios for a
number of years. Indeed, it was a not very well-kept secret
that the studios would be closing around 2011 and the operation would
move to three almost identically-sized studios at MediaCity in
Salford Quays. However, ITV made a surprise announcement in
March 2009. It transpired that the developer, Peel, had 'dramatically
scaled back' its financial commitment to the ITV element of the
project. An ITV spokesman stated that "as a result, ITV
will remain at its Quay Street base for the foreseeable
future." Interestingly, the staff were told that the focus
would now be on ensuring that the Quay St building was fit for purpose.

However,
it was clear that the area could not support two studio centres
within a few miles of each other, particularly when each had three
studios the same size. When the senior managers were replaced
following a reshuffle at the top of ITV, the new ones reopened the
negotiations with Peel. These lasted through most of 2010 until
an announcement was made on 16th December that the move would indeed
take place.

Andy
Walmsley has written to me. He is a very successful production
designer, now living and working in Hollywood, with an impressive CV
that includes shows such as American Idol and America's Got Talent.
He began his career aged 15 when Paul Daniels gave him the
opportunity to design a show he made at Ewarts Studios in
Wandsworth. Following formal training, he then based himself
here at Granada, working on dozens of LE shows when the studios were
really busy. He later worked in all the main studios around the country.

In
June 2015 he happened to be visiting Manchester and decided to have
a look at the outside of the Granada studios for one last time before
they were demolished - considering this studio centre his 'spiritual
home.' He discovered that the old reception area was now a
coffee shop and bought a cup. At some point, the security guard
became distracted and uncharacteristically (he claims!), he slipped
past and into the building.

He
discovered that it was completely empty - no film work going on
despite these studios being marketed as suitable locations - and he
spent 20 minutes or so wandering the corridors and standing inside
each of the studios which held so many memories for him. I
haven't mentioned till now that he had become used to visiting the
studios as a small boy as his father was a comic who appeared
regularly in shows such as The Comedians, and many well-known
entertainment stars were family friends.

He
took a few photos on his phone, some of which can be seen below:

Above
is studio 2 - the first to open in 1956, 4 years before the BBC's
Television Centre. The hard cyc is a recent addition - this
studio was the home of Granada Reports. Andy recalls
that behind the left wall below the aircon vents the studio steps
back at a lower height of 11 feet and this is where Bob Greaves sat
behind his desk. It was also the home of several Tony Wilson
late night magazine shows, where he gave local pop groups their first
break on TV, some later becoming big stars. Andy tells me that
studio 2 was also used for Coronation St in the very early
years and the Rovers Return set was based in the lower part of the studio.

Studio
6. For decades the home of Corrie but also used for
shows like The Comedians and The Wheeltappers and Shunters Club,
which many viewers assumed was a real working man's club.

Studio
8. Often used for dramas in the '60s, '70s and '80s - The
Krypton Factor was made in here too.

Studio
12. It was the home of many light entertainment shows
including Stars in Their Eyes but during the heyday of TV
studio drama, many classics were recorded in this studio with great
actors including Laurence Olivier. His family had close links
with Granada and he persuaded many top theatre and film stars to
appear in plays that were recorded here.

The
corridor linking the studios. I never saw it as empty as this
on the odd occasion I worked at 3sixtymedia (as it was called in its
last years) and I doubt it ever was in the Granada years. It
would have been full of lights, prop cages and loads of scenery.

The
final edition of Granada Reports came from studio 2 on 22nd
March 2013. The last show recorded in the main studios was an
edition of University Challenge made in studio 8 on 17th
February 2013. During the summer and autumn of 2013 studio 12
was used as a workshop to construct new sets for Coronation St.
Meanwhile, interestingly, I am told that studio 8 was left fully
equipped and in standby mode 'in case there were any problems at
MediaCity.' What could they have meant? This studio was
also used to record interviews for the Goodbye to Granadaland documentary.

Until
the building closed, studio 6 was used as the base for Provision -
ITV's lighting and camera hire company. The monopoles from
studio 6 were purchased by BBC S&PP and made their way to Elstree
stage 9 where they were discovered to be about 4 feet too short.
Each therefore had to have a 4-foot drop-arm on it. They
didn't last long. They were very heavy and frankly not terribly
safe - I witnessed two collapsing during rigging on a sitcom at
Elstree. In the summer of 2013 they were replaced with new ones
and the old Granada ones were skipped.

Meanwhile,
Coronation St remained for the time being in its old
studios. This move was delayed until the end of 2013 due to
various problems including the construction of the main production
building in Salford which it is said had to be dismantled during its
construction and rebuilt. The last Corrie was made at
Quay St on 20th December 2013.

The
office staff moved into the Orange building at MediaCity from the
autumn of 2012. As mentioned above, ITV have a block booking of
studio HQ4 at dock10 for Countdown, Jeremy Kyle and University
Challenge but the studio can also be used by other productions.

The
old Granada sign symbolically almost hidden by ivy during 2012.
The neon sign on the roof long gone. Ah well, that's progress.

photo
thanks to Andy Dobbs

In
August 2012 the press reported that the preferred bidder for the
site was 'Genr8 Developments', who apparently offered more than
£20m for the land. That doesn't sound very much to me for
a prime 13.5 acre site so maybe the press report was not
accurate. I also heard that the studios might have been
occupied by IKEA. (Make your own joke up here.) However,
in September 2013 it was reported that developer Allied London had
joined forces with Manchester City Council to acquire the site - they
paid a reported £26.5m.

In
January 2014 it was revealed that Allied London have taken a 5 year
lease on the studios and associated buildings whilst they 'work up'
their plans for redeveloping the site. In the meantime, the buildings
will become a new 'arts and cultural destination for Manchester.'

The
old Coronation St exterior set has been opened for public
tours once again - but most interestingly, 4 of the studios are now
being hired out as 4-wallers to hire for events or filming.
They are being marketed as 'Old Granada Studios.' They consist
of 'The Workshop', studio 8, 'stage 2' and studio 12. I
assume The Workshop was previously the Blue Shed and stage 2 was
previously part of the Starlight Theatre. However (see photos
above) they don't seem terribly busy!

Thus,
who'd have thought it? - the only large TV studios still owned by
ITV outside London are the old Yorkshire TV ones in Leeds. Of
which, see below...

The
Leeds Studios (aka Kirkstall Road, Yorkshire TV)

Yorkshire
TV Studios

thanks
to Wikipedia

Across
the Pennines are the Leeds Studios, which are owned by ITV.
They opened in 1968, when Yorkshire TV began its new franchise for
the north-east. The centre was constructed in Kirkstall Road on
slum-clearance land and was said to be the first purpose-built colour
television production centre in Europe. The building opened
with these studios...

studio
1/1A - two small presentation studios sharing facilities

studio
2 - 1,225 sq ft

studio
3 - 4,430 sq ft

These
three original studios were equipped with Marconi Mk VII colour
cameras. In 1969 EMI 2001 cameras were purchased for the last
studio to open...

studio
4 - 7,650 sq ft

Around
1976 Philips LDK 25 cameras replaced the Marconis in studio 3.

The
studio centre - still referred to by most people in the industry as
'Yorkshire TV' - is the base for the northern transmission area for
ITV. Of the original four, only studios 3 and 4 remained in use
during the first decade of the 21st century. Studio 3 had been
the home of Countdown since 1982 when Channel 4 began
broadcasting. Studio 4 had in latter years been mostly used as
a 4-waller for dramas including Heartbeat, Where The Heart
Is, The Royal, A Touch of Frost, Fat Friends, Bodies and Wire
In The Blood, but was also used occasionally for multicamera work
with Bruce's Price is Right ('95 - '01), My Parents Are Aliens, Question
Time, Emmerdale, Bullseye and Win My Wage. In March
and April 2006 Mastermind was recorded here as ITV's
Manchester studios were closed due to asbestos contamination. A
celebrity edition of the snooker show Pot Black was made for
Sport Relief in May 2006.

Sadly,
The
Royal and Heartbeat were axed by ITV in 2008, with A
Touch of Frost ending in 2009. Once ITV's Manchester
Studios were fully operational again the old YTV studios had very few
bookings during 2008/9 so their long-term future became doubtful. Countdown
was the only regular occupant of studio 3, with 4 being empty for
much of the time.

As
many had feared, on 4th March 2009 Michael Grade (yes, him again)
announced that the main studios would indeed be closing and Countdown
would move to Manchester.Emmerdale's
production offices, post production work and interior set shooting
would continue to be based in the buildings adjoining the centre
(with exterior filming continuing at the programme's purpose built
facilities in Harewood) and the local ITV news programme Calender
would also continue to be based in its existing facilities at the site.

Incidentally,
I noted that Michael Grade referred to the soap as 'Emmerdale
Farm' in his interview on Radio 4's Today
programme. It hasn't been called that since 1989 so I'm sure
that will have gone down very well with the production team.
One assumes he wasn't a regular viewer himself. When asked
about the Leeds Studios closure Mr Grade dismissed the question by
simply replying - "We move on." With those blunt and
rather tactless words he appeared to end 41 years of television from
these studios.

ITV
said that the studios would be 'mothballed' although the likelihood
of them being brought back into operation by ITV looked slim.
For a while there remained a chance that the studios might be run by
an independent company with support from Screen Yorkshire and/or
Yorkshire Forward, offering facilities to independent production
companies. However, in May 2009 Yorkshire Forward announced
that they had ruled out making a rescue bid.

The
last edition of Countdown
was recorded on 22nd April 2009. The show moved to Manchester's
old Granada studios operated by 3sixtymedia and is now made in Peel's
studios in MediaCity.

In
December 2009 there was a dramatic change of fortune for the
studios. Rumours that had been circulating for about six months
were confirmed. The studios received a £5.2m refit during
2010/2011 which included the latest HD tapeless facilities. The
work was completed in summer 2011 and Emmerdale moved its
interior sets, post production facilities and production offices into
the building. These were previously housed in an old car
showroom and were in need of updating.

The
refit has been considerable to say the least. The building was
radically changed internally and includes no less than five
studios. The two existing studios were completely refurbished
and were joined by two converted from service dock areas and one in
the former joinery workshop. They have been acoustically
treated and have TV resin floors and lighting grids. A sixth
new studio space was planned for internal shots of police stations
and hospitals but has not yet been created. These sets
currently remain at 102 Kirkstall Rd.

Two
new gallery suites were also constructed along with a number of
dressing rooms, prop stores, make-up areas and other facilities.
This is all quite a contrast to the bad news announced by Michael Grade.

So
the future of the studios is, after all, secure. At least, for
as long as Emmerdale continues to run. (Don't mention The
Bill.)

Thus
the studios are now as follows:

studio
1 - a space on the 1st floor intended to be used for the police
station and hospital.

studio
2 - was the scene dock of studio 3

studio
3 (original) - contains the Woolpack and back rooms

studio
4 (original) - contains the factory, cafe and Home Farm

studio
5 - was the scene dock for studio 4

studio
6 - was the chippies workshop.

Studios
2, 5 and 6 have simple scaffold lighting grids, The two
production galleries can control any of the studio spaces.
Occasionally the old space in Burley Road is used for sets shooting PSC.

The
exteriors for Emmerdale have been shot since 1998 on a
purpose-built set on the Harewood estate near Leeds. The houses
in the 'village' at Harewood are timber framed structures covered in
stone cladding. The set is built on green belt land so all the
buildings were originally classed as 'temporary structures' with a
requirement to be demolished within ten years. However, further
planning permission was granted and the set is effectively permanent,
at least one assumes for as long as the programme continues to run.

Independent
regional studios

Endemol
West/BBC S&PP at Paintworks -
Bristol

part
of the Paintworks complex.

with
thanks to the Paintworks website

One
relatively recent development on the regional studios front was the
move of Endemol to Bristol, thus creating Endemol West. This
happened in 2004 when they moved into an old paint factory in the
centre of the city. Endemol is an international media business
that owns several TV production companies making gameshows, quiz
shows, entertainment and drama. They decided that for the kind
of programmes they planned to make here - long-running gameshows and
quiz shows that take up a great deal of studio time - it would make
sense to own their own studios rather than hire them. Thus over
a few years they steadily converted parts of the old factory into no
less than seven multicamera studios, controlled by up to four
production gallery suites - although these were put together using
temporary flyaway kit, as and when required.

A
typical studio space in the Paintworks building

with
thanks to the Paintworks website

The
studios had chipboard TV floors and very basic scaffold or trussing
lighting grids. Endemol didn't need anything more flexible as
they were used for shows with standing sets which, once lit, could
stay in position for weeks, months or in the case of Deal
or No Deal - years. The buildings
Endemol West occupied were part of the 'Paintworks' development.
This is a large, trendy, Victorian industrial complex that contains
a number of other media companies and some very small businesses such
as artists and designers. It includes an art gallery, bars and
restaurants and is described as 'Bristol's new arts and media
quarter.' It is considered locally to be a great success and
benefit to the community.

Between
2004 and 2009 these studios were busy making a number of Endemol
shows including Brainteaser
for Five, Efourum
for E4, Art School
for BBC2, Gala Bingo
for Gala TV, The Restaurant for BBC2 and C4's huge hit Deal
or No Deal which began in October 2005.
At their busiest, the studios reportedly transmitted eight hours of
live television every day. The operation here employed between
80 and 300 staff, depending on the work in hand. However,
Endemol's operation here was scaled back during the early part of
2010 and for much of that year Deal or No Deal was the only
show being made here.

The
'studios' were as follows:

studio
1 - 5,200 sq ft

studio
2-3 - 3,000 sq ft

studio
5 - 2,000 sq ft

studio
6 - 7,000 sq ft

studio
7 - 1,600 sq ft

In
a surprise development that frankly very few people would have seen
coming, in October 2010 it was announced that BBC Studios and Post
Production (S&PP) had taken over the management and operation of
these studios, working for and with Endemol.
Deal or No Deal continued but no
other shows booked space here. Post production for that show
continued to be done by The Farm on-site in a separate part of
the building. S&PP is the BBC-owned company that used to
run BBC TV Centre in west London. However, this certainly
wasn't seen as a possible site to 'move' Television Centre to when
those studios closed. This contract was simply a way of
increasing revenue for the S&PP business when Endemol were
looking for a company to take over the responsibility of running the studio.

Paintworks
is owned by London-based firm Verve Properties. Since the
autumn of 2013 they have been expanding the Paintworks site.
This has involved the demolition of some unused buildings and the
construction of a large number of new ones in the style of the
existing old industrial units. The building containing the
studios is being retained but sits directly alongside the new
development so construction noise has prevented any use until the
summer of 2015. However, it seems unlikely that these buildings
will be used as TV studios again.

This,
believe it or not, is the space that was used as the Deal or No Deal
studio at The Paintworks. (Not exactly Television Centre is
it?) This photo was taken on the last day of Endemol/S&PP's
occupation. Every last thing has been removed - except the
chipboard floor. Note the very low roof. This was often
seen in wideshots on the show and the new studio has its lighting
trussing deliberately low in order to recreate this look.

photo
thanks to Tim Deane

BBC
S&PP have taken over part of a warehouse in The Bottle Yard -
a 4-waller studio complex on the outskirts of Bristol (see
below.) Deal or No Deal has been made there since
October 2013. The technical equipment from the old studio was
moved to the Bottle Yard and a new TV studio was created for the show
within the warehouse space. At the time, this was reported as a
temporary measure until returning to the Paintworks in 2015 but I
understand that the intention is to remain indefinitely at the Bottle Yard.

Verve
were also in negotiation during 2009/2010 to buy the old HTV
Bristol studios from ITV, which are situated nearby on the Bath
Road in Arnos Vale. These were unused for some years, except as
a base for the local ITV Westcountry news, although some office space
was also let to a few media and software companies. The local
council apparently stipulated that the site had to be used for
entertainment purposes so it couldn't simply be sold off for offices
or housing. Having said that, in fact the main studio was
converted to offices some years ago. A 125 year lease was begun
in 1958 with the then ITV company TWW. It seems that ITV failed
to sell the property to Verve.

I
understand that the sale did however go through later with another
developer and the building was gutted and extensively refurbished by
them to create contemporary office spaces. ITV have retained
their news studio facilities on the site which have been extensively
refurbished. The building is now known as Bath Road Studios.

Studio
1 - soon after opening with its EMI 203 cameras. The image on
the right hand end of the cyc is being back projected - see below.

The
Bristol studios as built for TWW consisted of Studio 1 (90ft x 65ft)
and Studio 2 (30ft x 20ft). Intriguingly, the main studio
(which was a very useful size anyway) also had a 'back projection
tunnel' which added another 1,100 sq ft. This was an extension
to the studio enabling a projector to have sufficient throw to
display a large image onto the back of a cyclorama. To my
knowledge, this ingenious design is inique in all the UK's TV studios
(although the HTV Cardiff studio also had an extention about 15 feet
deep on one wall which was sometimes used as an audience area so
perhaps this could have partly been its original purpose.) As
well as adding some extra useful floor area at other times this BP
area could also apparently be used as a small studio in its own right.

The
BP projector in its tunnel or 'studio'. The image can be seen
on the right of the photo - this would appear on the cyclorama in the
main studio.

Mike
Emery informs me that the main studio was converted to colour in
April 1970 with EMI 2001s - they were replaced in 1981 with RCA
TK-47s. These cameras were reportedly disliked by the cameramen
due to their length and in 1990, when HTV closed their studio in Mold
(North Wales), the cameras from there made their way to Bristol.
These were Sony BVP-360s and BVP-3 portables.

In
the early 1970s the studios were refurbished by HTV and a new studio
(53ft x 33ft) built for the local news operation. This was
apparently a temporary conversion of part of the vehicle garage.
The studios were also renumbered so the original large studio became
Studio 5 and the new studio was called Studio 7.

Studio
5 was decommissioned in April 1996 to make way for a £3m
digital news and transmission centre. Regional production
studios were out of fashion in those days so like many others it had
to go. The whole building was extensively reconstructed and the
result was a large open-plan office area with top-lit atrium and a
2,000sq ft news studio, located where the back-projection tunnel used
to be. The first news broadcast from this new facility was on
23rd April 1997.

The
Bottle Yard Studios -
Bristol

In
2010 yet another film/TV studio complex that was previously an
industrial plant was opened. It was originally the main
bottling plant of Harvey's - famous for their Bristol Cream sherry
since 1882, although the business itself was established in
1796. Unfortunately for those working for them, they decided to
move their operation away from here around 2008.

The
city council took over the site after it was empty for a couple of
years with the hope that it could become used as studios for shooting
TV drama - although there was no intention to invest heavily in any
conversion of the spaces into conventional sound stages. What
they do have is thousands of square feet of warehouse space -
unusually with relatively high ceiling height - and four large
buildings with very high ceilings called 'Tank Houses.'

Below
is Tank House 2. Its size is hard to judge from this photo but
it is very large - around 16,000 sq ft in fact. The columns
have so far not proved to be too much of a issue - sets are simply
built round them. I can confirm however that the acoustic is
very lively! A clap of the hands took quite a while to die away.

I
visited the studios in May 2015 and was very impressed with what had
been achieved with relatively little investment. The whole site
was busy with various productions. Two of the Tank House stages
had large standing sets from US musical comedy series Galavant
and one had just finished shooting Poldark and was expecting a
new booking shortly. A new stage had been created within the
warehouse space for a children's drama and at one end of the
warehouse a complete very realistic supermarket set was being
restocked for the next series of Trollied. Meanwhile, in
another part of the huge building was the TV studio and all its
surrounding facilities created by BBC S&PP for Deal or No Deal.
Sets for various productions were neatly lined up in storage in
other areas.

A
number of highly regarded drama and comedy single camera TV
productions have already made use of these facilities in the short
time they have been open. These include Trollied, The Fear,
Frankie, Inside Men,Dirk
Gently, Five Daughters, Excluded, Public Enemies, Hit the Road Jack,
New Worlds, Poldark, Sherlock (2015
Christmas special), The Lost Honour of Christopher Jeffries and
Wolf Hall.

A
number of support companies are also located here including 180
Rental, Filmscape, TR Scaffolding, Grip Services, Location One and
several more.

A
well as huge areas of warehouse space, the facilities on offer include:

Tank
House 1 - 112 x 100ft

Tank
House 2 - 157 x 100ft (includes a 90m long green screen/cyc)

Tank
House 3 - two areas, one 69ft wide, the other 56ft at a length of
102ft. The first area has a roof height of an impressive 65ft!

Tank
House 4 - an irregular shape with some columns of about 13,000 sq ft.

As
mentioned above, in 2013 one of the warehouse areas was converted by
BBC S&PP into a fully equipped TV studio for C4's Deal or No Deal.
This show moved here from The Paintworks - also in Bristol.
The new studio opened in October 2013. The studio is larger
than the one they left in the Paintworks - 93 x 87 metric feet (about
8,000 sq ft.). It is surprisingly high - around 9m - which is
unusual in converted industrial units. It does have 4 pillars
within the working area but these have not proved to be a
problem. There is a well-equipped control room suite and a 9
suite post production facility run by The Farm. In May 2015 The
Farm announced that they would be expanding this facility to offer
post services to other productions based at The Bottle Yard.

Above
is the warehouse space that was converted into the Deal or No
Deal studio and supporting facilities. There are thousands
of square feet of space like this in the building - some being used
as a garage, some to store scenery and some has been turned into
stages. The permanent set for Trollied occupies a
similar space to this at the other end of the building. The
very useful roof height is clear to see. Just a few years ago
this area was full of thousands of bottles of Harveys Bristol Cream.

Below,
the TV studio with its trussing being installed. The 4 pillars
were cleverly incorporated into the show's set design.

photos
thanks to Tim Deane

The
lighting grid consists of a widely spaced trussing mother grid from
which other trusses are suspended and there is a basic chipboard
floor but other facilities are very good indeed. There is a
large production office, wardrobe, make-up, meeting rooms, audience
handling area, contestant green room, canteen and rest area.

There
were initially press reports that S&PP would return to the
Paintworks in 2015 but the intention is for them to remain here at
the Bottle Yard for the foreseeable future. They are keen for
the studio to be booked by other productions in the months when Deal
or No Deal is not recording.

Black
Hangar Studios, Hampshire

Located
on Lasham airfield, a few miles from Basingstoke, this facility
opened in May 2012. It basically consists of a large hangar -
32,000 sq ft in fact - and associated buildings containing production
offices, wardrobe, make-up and 12,000 sq ft of workshop space.
Its USP is that it also has an outdoor elevated water tank of 5,000
sq ft with an optical shooting panel in the side. This usefully
has a 180 degree natural skyline. The business also owns nearby
land that can be used as a backlot with natural countryside all
round. Clients include The Garden for ITV.

Stone
Hill Park, Manston, Kent

RAF
Manston, famous as a WWII Battle of Britain airfield, became a
commercial airport in 1989 renamed rather grandly as 'Kent
International Airport'. The RAF still had a presence here until
1999. It had a very large runway and good facilities but
unfortunately, probably due to its location, it never received
sufficient flights to enable it to make a profit and following
several changes of ownership over the years, in May 2014 it closed.

In
the autumn of the same year, businessmen Trevor Cartner and Chris
Musgrave acquired the site and renamed it Stone Hill Park. They
announced plans costing £1bn including 2,500 homes, leisure
facilities and a 'heritage' grass runway for vintage aircraft.
The site inevitably has a number of large hangars and in June 2015
press reports indicated that the new owners were in discussions with
a consortium looking to create a film studio here. One assumes
some of the hangars would be used as stages and the site could
probably be available for filming relatively quickly once a deal has
been done.

Dragon
Studios - South
Wales (2009
- present)

For
nearly the whole of the first decade of the 21st century, various
evolving plans were announced for an ambitious development in south
Wales. This was Dragon International Studios, sited mid-way
between Cardiff and Swansea - nicknamed 'Valleywood.' The
complex was to be based at Llanilid which is just off junction 35 of
the M4 near Bridgend. The scheme was originally a £330m
film studio and 'media city' with the late Richard Attenborough as
its chairman.

When
first announced in 2001, the plans included twelve sound stages,
five silent stages and two fully equipped TV studios of 8,000sq ft
and 12,000sq ft respectively. If it had been completed as
planned, the complex would have been bigger than any other UK film studio.

The
site of Dragon Studios. It occupies an impressive 1,000 acres
and was previously an open-cast coal mine. The M4 is in the
foreground - the site is near junction 35 but it was hoped that a new
junction connecting directly to the site would eventually be
built. The drawing below shows how it might have looked upon
completion. The existing 4 stages are located top left of this
illustration. In fact, the whole scheme is not completely dead
- some of this may yet happen!

The
scheme was granted outline planning consent in 2004. When completed,
the site was to include hotels, housing 'for sale or rent to
media-related occupiers', business park, 'drama village', training
facilities, hospital, golf course and even a theme park. It was
hoped that other supporting industries would be attracted to the
area, providing local employment.

Sadly,
the project encountered many problems and its target date for
opening was for ever being postponed. In fact, that passed in
2004, 2006, 2007 and 2008.

Early
problems were caused by a lack of support from the Welsh Assembly
which was later secured. Then came delays in obtaining funding,
which threatened a move to another site. In January 2004 Lord
Attenborough announced that work was about to begin but as luck would
have it some rare dormice were found living on the site in September
which delayed work until 2005. (I'm not making this up.)
The next delay was caused by issues surrounding permits for sewerage
works. Nothing happened until October 2005. Bad weather
then stopped the work (during a Welsh winter? - surely not) and
construction was due to start in March 2006. As far as I can
discover, it did not happen after all.

In
October 2006 it was announced that the first phase of five silent
stages (described rather tactlessly by a local councillor as 'posh
warehouses') would at last begin construction soon. These were
planned to open in 2007 but once again, it seems that construction
did not happen. At the time these stages were said to be aimed
at 'TV drama and low budget feature film' production.

However,
at last there was some progress. Judy Wasdell, the studio
coordinator, wrote to me in January 2008 with some exciting news...

'We
started construction in August 2007 on phase one of the development
which consists of four sound stages (1 x 20,000sq ft and 3 x 10,000sq
ft), each with adjoining production offices. We anticipate the
first of these will be completed by the spring with the final stage
ready by the summer.

We
hope to be submitting a detailed planning application shortly for
phase two of the studios which will consist of a number of workshops
and a studio village with further production/post-production space, a
preview theatre and commissary.'

We
originally planned phase one of our project to consist of a number
of silent stages but have since upgraded the spec on these so they
are now soundproofed. We may have TV studios within a later
phase but we won't have any stages specifically designed to TV immediately.'

Unfortunately,
even this relatively modest development became a victim of the
banking crisis. Yet another setback occurred in March 2008 when
the development was put on hold and the administrators were called
in. According to Broadcast magazine on 14th October 2008...

'The
scheme, financed through a mix of private and public money and
chaired by Richard Attenborough, apparently ran out of funding at a
time when investors were starting to tighten up on property
development money. However, administrator Rob Lewis, a partner
at accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, didn't rule out the
possibility of finding alternative means of finance. "The
preferred option would be to see the studios completed and films
being made there, or to mothball the site until something else comes
along," he says.' They appointed property consultants
Edward Symmons to try to sell the studios and to market them as a
going concern in the meantime. In fact the four stages with
their attached production offices were then completed and became
available for use around 2009.

David
Ferris is the man in charge and he has kindly written to me with
some up to date information as of February 2014:

The
site currently in use occupies 24 acres and has the 4 stages plus
planning consent for one more. There is also a back lot of
around 5 acres with power and water. The three 10,000 sq ft
stages have air conditioned offices of around 3,800 sq ft and the
largest (stage 2) has offices of 6,900 sq ft plus a pit within the
stage (see below.) David tells me that the stages are very much
open for business - he hopes to announce an exciting new occupation
very soon.

The
images above show the site as it stands now. The bottom photo
was taken inside stage 2 which includes a pit, as can be seen.

photos
thanks to David Ferris

For
a while it looked as though these studios might have been bought by
the BBC no less. In November 2008 the Corporation announced
that they were looking at various sites to set up a new production
centre. Wales was planned to become a 'creative hub' for drama
- with Casualty crossing the Severn estuary from Bristol in
2011. The four stages here were briefly considered as a
possible base but in the end the attractions of Cardiff Bay won out
and the BBC announced in 2009 that they would set up their new drama
HQ at Roath Lock. There seems to be a fascination for building
studios next to water - have you noticed?

In
fact the BBC did use one of the stages in 2010 for the first series
of Upstairs Downstairs. Curiously, one end of the
staircase was located here at Dragon Studios but the other end was on
a stage at Upper Boat studios (The Dr Who base) - several
miles away. Nope - makes no sense to me either. For the
second series both ends were united at the new Roath Lock
studios. Dr Who briefly used the studios in Sep 2010 for
the 'Doctor's Wife' episode. Whites (comedy series with
Alan Davies) and Merlin have also been shot here. I
gather a live audience show for S4C was also made on one of the stages.

The
studios have actually been used to make a movie. In 2009/2010
the film Ironclad,
starring Paul Giamatti, Brian Cox and Derek Jacobi was shot
here. The stages were used for interiors and a replica of
Rochester Castle was built on the lot. The castle set was sadly
dismantled a year or two later. It seems that so far, no other
features have been made here. This seems surprising - having
four decent sized stages and a large back lot on a self-contained
site would, I'd have thought, be ideal as a base for a film or TV
drama series. Maybe the right people don't realise that it is here.

In
fact it has now been used to film a drama series - in 2015 The
Bastard Executioner was shot here. It was a 10 episode
drama made by Fox for the FX channel. The show had a
provisional booking for 5 years but unfortunately only 1 series was
commissioned and the show left the studios at the end of January 2016.

The
studios don't appear to have their own website and some people seem
to think that the site is closed. It isn't. If you happen
to be interested in renting space here you could try contacting David
Ferris on dferris@lsh.co.uk.

Enfys
Studios - Cardiff (1990
- present)

Enfys
was formed in 1984 by Alwyn Roberts. Having left TV-am he
invested in a 750sq ft studio and a small OB truck, specialising in
making programmes for transmission in Wales. The business did
well and in 1990 they moved to their present site, building two
studios - one at 4,800 sq ft and the other at 1,000 sq ft.
Studio 1 is 79 x 57 metric feet wall to wall. Studio 2 is 34 x
30 metric feet wall to wall. The studios share a well equipped
gallery suite. The studios are HD capable and studio 1 recently
had a new floor laid.

As
well as programmes for S4C and BBC Wales, the studio also made a
series of BBC2 quiz Only Connect in 2014. With the
closure of Studio 1 at Culverhouse Cross, this is the only
independent studio remaining in Wales.

Barcud
Derwen - North Wales (1992
- 2010)

Based
in Caernarfon, for a number of years Barcud established themselves as
the leading provider of OB facilities in Wales. Merging with
Derwen in 1992 to form Barcud Derwen they set about building a couple
of studios.

Studio
1 was 88ft x 72 ft (6,300 sq ft) and had pull-out audience seating on
one wall for up to 250 people. It had a saturated lighting rig
with motorised bars and 450 dimmers. The gallery was equipped
to support up to 12 cameras. Studio 2 had a simple scaffold
grid and was 52ft x 31 ft. The two studios shared one gallery suite.

The
studios mostly made programmes for the Welsh market but did make one
series I know of that was not purely for Wales - Captain Mack
for CITV.

Sadly,
in June 2010 it was announced that Barcud Derwen had got into
financial difficulties due to cash-flow and entered
administration. The administrators immediately closed the
Caernarfon facility with the loss of 30 jobs. Sadly no buyer
was found for these facilities and during the summer of 2010 much of
the technical equipment was sold on eBay, the studio's Galaxy
lighting console being bought by Riverside TV in Hammersmith.

Pinewood
StudioWales
(2015 - present)

On
17th February 2014 it was announced that the Pinewood Group would be
creating a new studio complex in south Wales. The site was
previously owned by G24 Innovations - a company that designed and
manufactured small flexible solar cells. Unfortunately, they
went into administration in December 2012. The business was
purchased in March 2013 and a new company was formed - G24i Power
Ltd. This company moved to a new base just along the coast in
Newport and recommenced manufacturing in November 2013.

The
plant they vacated was known as The Energy Centre - it even includes
its own wind turbine - and is located in Wentloog, between Cardiff
and Newport. It was constructed in 1998 and is said to be in
very good condition. The 180,000 sq ft building is near to the
coast and would certainly be a very attractive place to make films or
TV dramas. Pinewood already own other studios in various
locations around the world including Canada, Germany, Malaysia and
the USA.

The
BBC have invested heavily in their Roath Lock facility in Cardiff for
their drama department. Many other television dramas have been
made by independent companies in and around south Wales in recent
years in less than ideal adapted buildings so this facility is bound
to be welcomed, particularly with the investment that Pinewood can
put into it. Incidentally, you'd think from the press and TV
reports that the next James Bond movie is due to be made here.
That's obviously not happening but why let facts get in the way of a
good story?

The
building is actually owned by the Welsh government - they bought it
for a reported £6m. Pinewood have taken out a minimum 5
year lease. The government put up £1m towards fitting out
the studios - the total cost was estimated to be £1.8m so for
the price of a modest 3-bedroom house in London it looks as though
Pinewood have got a pretty good deal there. Within the building
there will be 2 acoustically treated stages, each of 20,000 sq ft
plus an additional 30,000 sq ft of shooting floor. The height
to roof beams is currently reported to be 7m (23ft), which is
relatively low for purpose-built film stages (Pinewood's own stages
range from about 35 - 50ft in height) but typical for converted
industrial units such as these. Unless the roofs are raised,
this will limit the range of sets that can be built within them.

The
Welsh government has also agreed to invest up to £30m into
projects brought forward by Pinewood. They will then share in
any profits made from sales of productions filmed here that they have
invested in. Of course, the current tax breaks for large scale
TV drama make the UK a very attractive place to film major
international series. Recent productions filmed in Wales have
included Da Vinci's Demons and Atlantis.

The
studios were completed early in 2015. In January it was
announced that the first booking would be a pilot for a major
historical drama series called The Bastard Executioner.
It is made by Fox 21, Imagine TV and FX Productions and intended for
international distribution. A remake of The Crow is also
being made here.

UTV
- Belfast

UTV
- the independent TV company serving Northern Ireland - has a studio
centre in Belfast but no large production studios. It does have
a 1,600 sq ft (149 sq m) studio that in 2010 was given an infinity
cyc that can be used for green screen recordings (or blue or white if
required.) UTV's main studio (studio 1) is used for their daily UTV
Live programme.

Titanic
Studios - Belfast

Titanic
Studios - the original Paint Hall to the right and the new stages on
the left.

thanks
for the above photo to Jeff McCrory

Below
- architects' drawing of the new 2014 development. 'TQ' stands
for Titanic Quarter, the area in which the studios are located.

Northern
Ireland Screen have been renting Titanic
Studios (formerly the Paint Hall
studio) from Harland and Wolff shipyard since 2007 for use as four
sound stages. The building consists of four16,000 sq ft 'cells'
within a huge structure, each with enormous doors to the outside
world and connected by internal streets. The roof height is an
impressive 90 ft and each stage contains a lighting truss grid that
can be raised or lowered. Seasons 1 - 5 of
Game of Thrones were madehere
for HBO and Sky Atlantic from 2010. At least two more seasons
are planned. Feature films have included City
of Ember in 2007 and Your
Highness in 2009.

In
2012 two new 20,000 sq ft purpose-built stages were completed here
alongside the Paint Hall. They are within one long building and
were used for the third season of Game
of Thrones along with the original
Paint Hall stages.

Early
in 2014 a planning application was lodged to expand the studios even
further. £14m was set aside to build two more stages plus
associated workshops and other facilities totalling 100,000 sq
ft. This will bring the whole site to more than 250,000 sq
ft. The new facility has solar panels on its roof, reducing
electricity costs. Planning permission was granted in August.

This
all compares very well with Scotland, where they have been talking
for many years about building new film studios and stages but so far,
apart from converting an old factory to enable Outlander to be
made, they have actually built nothing.

Ardmore
Studios - Ireland

Not in
the UK of course but just in case you were wondering - Ardmore
Studios in Bray, County Wicklow in the Republic of Ireland opened in
1958 after years of local campaigning. Film making in Ireland
before then had been limited to location shooting only - of which of
course the country has many beautiful ones to offer. Studios in
the UK or Hollywood had previously to be used to complete pictures
but once Ardmore opened they could provide a total service.

They
have been busy ever since making highly acclaimed international
movies and TV dramas. The studio has five stages -
the largest of which is stage D at 15,000 sq ft and is where the
popular drama The Tudors
was filmed between 2006 and 2010. Other TV dramas have included
The Old Curiosity Shop with Derek
Jacobi made for ITV and Camelot (2010, 2011), which was an
Irish-Canadian co-production starring Joseph Fiennes and Eva
Green. Moone Boy, a sitcom starring Chris O'Dowd made by
Baby Cow for Sky 1 was also filmed here in 2012 and 2013. At
least three series are planned. Other recent bookings have been Ice
Cream Girls, The Widower and Mary Queen of Scots. Penny
Dreadful has been based here since 2013 and is booked into
2016. Many well known features have been shot here over the
years too.

Five
minutes away, The Ardmore Film Factory opened in June 2015. It
contains converted warehouse space with 30,000 sq ft of shooting
space and 11,000 sq ft of office space to accommodate overspill.
Meanwhile there are plans to build a new 20,000 sq ft stage on the
main site.

In May
2015 it was announced that Ardmore Studios had been working closely
with Limerick City and County Council to set up a new facility in the
old Dell computer factory in Castletroy. It has 350,000 sq ft
of useful space and will be converted into several stages for the use
of feature and TV drama production. The first booking is likely
to be the sci-fi feature Inversion, which is due to begin
shooting in 2016.

Film
City - Glasgow

The
creation of Film City was driven by Gillian Berrie, co-founder
of Sigma Films. She was inspired by a visit to 'Film City'
(possibly it loses something in the translation) in Denmark in 2000
whilst being fully aware of the demand for a similar base for
independent Scottish film and TV companies. Govan Town Hall had
been used for location filming several times before but when she
worked there she realised that it was the perfect spot to take over
as a permanent base for the local industry. £3.5m was
raised from various sources to refurbish the building and provide it
with the necessary facilities. It opened in phases from 2004.

The
building contains an impressive new Dolby post production theatre
plus a Foley stage, ADR stage, dubbing theatres and 9 edit
suites. There are also picture grading suites.

Currently,
the old Victorian building provides office, meeting room and the
post production facilities mentioned above but it also has the
original 5,000 sq ft performance hall complete with audience seating
on a balcony. This is described by Film City as a 'build
space'. There is sufficient flat floored area in front of the
seating to construct reasonably large sets with ground-support truss
for lighting but it could not be described as a typical sound
stage. There is no acoustic treatment on the walls for
example. These facilities have been used for School of Silence
(CBBC), Iron Chef UK (C4) and T4's Transmission amongst others.

Above
is the build space being used for a simple shoot. Below shows
the attractive decor and the size of the room and its useful audience seating.

photo
below thanks to www.iamdofilmmaker.co.uk

In May
2013 it was announced that Creative Scotland had ring-fenced £1m
for further development. The intention was to redevelop some
existing buildings close to the Film City HQ in Govan Town Hall and
create 15,000 sq ft of production space. There was also the
prospect of two purpose-built stages, at least one of them around
20,000 sq ft, being built on open land between Film City and the
BBC's PQ building. £10m funding was sought from
various partnership sources. Unfortunately, no development has
so far been forthcoming.

The
land that may be the site of new film stages. Govan Town Hall
- 'Film City' - is in the background.

For
the past few years there has been much discussion about the provision
of large studio space in Scotland. They have seen TV series
like Game of Thrones
being made in Northern Ireland and would like some of that kind of
work too. Some ex-industrial properies have been used on
occasion for filming - most notably the international TV drama Outlander
is being filmed in Wardpark Studios
in Cumbernauld. This former Isola factory offers 65,000 sq ft
of facilities. There are currently 2 sound stages but it is
hoped that once filming has ended, the studios will continue in use
and more stages will be converted from the existing industrial
units. However, this series may go on for many years (series 2
was announced in August 2014) so the facilities will not be available
for other productions until then. The concern that Film City
has is that money earmarked for investment in new stages in Glasgow
will instead be spent on these facilities in Cumbernauld.
Either that, or other possible schemes including the proposed studios
at Straiton - more on these below.

The
former Isola factory that is now Wardpark Studios

The
Scottish government seems to be very good at arranging reports and
consultations on the need for film studios in Scotland but so far has
achieved very little in practical terms. As mentioned above,
Film City are desperate to build 2 new stages on land near their
existing facilities. They just need the green light and some
cash support from the government which can then be matched with
private funding. The Welsh government have been very generous
in supporting their industry and as a result Pinewood opened a
facility near Cardiff early in 2015. This news was met with
anger and frustration by the Scottish film industry.

Another
Scottish government report (involving 'Scottish Enterprise' and
'Creative Scotland') was published in March 2014. This
unsurprisingly came to the conclusion that yes, we do need more
stages to make films and TV dramas in Scotland. The sites they
identified are exactly the same ones as were suggested in previous
reports. Well I never. This includes the Film City site in
Glasgow of course, which I have read is the preferred choice of
Scottish Enterprise. So is the money about to be handed over
enabling development to commence? Apparently not. The
chief executive of 'Creative Scotland' decided to prepare yet another
report to see exactly what needs to be done. Meanwhile, TV
dramas and feature films are being made in new or converted studios
in South Wales, Belfast, Manchester, Bristol, Yorkshire and London.

As
if there hadn't been enough reports into the lack of facilities
supporting the industry in Scotland, in July 2015 it was announced
that Westminster's Scottish Affairs Committee is joining in the
creation of all this hot air and paperwork. They are to hold an
enquiry into how the creative industries in Scotland contribute to
the economy, as well as how UK-wide policies such as tax relief
affect Scotland.

Pentland
Studios - Straiton, near Edinburgh

Whilst
the great and good were having meetings and writing reports about the
future of film making in Scotland, in August 2014 a developer (PSLL)
announced an actual plan. This is very ambitious and could
provide the facilities that Scotland desperately needs. It
consists of a group of stages, workshops and support facilities to be
built in phases as part of a much larger development containing
housing, retail, a hotel and a business park. These studios are
intended for features and TV dramas which could also of course make
use of Scotland's spectacular scenery for location shooting, only a
short drive from here.

If
given the go-ahead it could scupper the chances of stages being built
at Film City in Glasgow or any of the other possible schemes as it is
hard to see the Scottish government supporting two proposals.
This would be a shame for Glasgow but it does look like a very
promising development that could seriously compete with the new film
studios in other parts of the UK.

The
intention was to open some stages by the first quarter of 2017.
The plans include two 15,000 sq ft 'studios', two 20,000 sq ft stages
and two 30,000 sq ft stages. There is also a 45,000 sq ft
'water stage', two back lots totalling about 30 acres and 55,000 sq
ft of workshop space. The plans include a film academy, student
accommodation and a hotel.

Following
public consultation in October 2014, a planning application was
submitted in May 2015. The local council were due to determine
the application by September. Unfortunately and quite
bafflingly, yet again the Scots seem unable to take a decision
regarding the building of film studios. In December, the
developer asked the Scottish Government to call in its planning
application, claiming that the local Midlothian council had taken too
long to consider its proposals. They had hoped to open the
studios early in 2017 but that timetable will now inevitably slip.

Things
took a turn for the worse in February 2016 - it was reported in The
Scotsman that planners have insisted that the scheme should be thrown
out as it would cause disruption to local residents, is unsuitable
for green belt land and would hamper the growth of the Edinburgh
Science Triangle development. It was reported that the
consortium behind the studios is appealing and a ruling will be made
by the Scottish Government 'at a later date.'

Quite extraordinary.
Scottish producer Willy Wands declared that the continuing lack of a
Scottish film studio was a 'national disgrace' and I can't help but
completely agree with him.

Above
- the scale of the whole development is clear to see. The
mauve section centre bottom is the film studio site with the green
areas being the back lots.

Below
is how the stages could be laid out. All very exciting but
will it ever get built - or will this be Scotland's version of
'Valleywood' in South Wales?

Studio
City Scotland - Dundee

Just
when you thought Scotland might at last have got its act together -
another proposal for a studio site was revealed in January 2015.
This time in Dundee. It has the name of Studio City Scotland
and is planned to be built on land next to Claverhouse Industrial
Park. The scheme has the backing of actor Brian Cox and
producer Barrie Osborne. Interestingly, according to press
reports, Creative Scotland said they knew nothing of the project when
it was announced!

It
seems that the planning for this project has been carried out in
great secrecy but according to the press, in May 2015 the funding and
backing for the project was in place. Figures of £80m or
£120m have been quoted and the studios are planned to be the
'greenest' in the world. No details of the stages or other
facilities have been revealed but the American architects are said to
have a long track record in designing studios. The project is
also planned to support the local games design industry.

It
seems unlikely (but not impossible) that both this and the Pentland
Studios projects will go ahead so it will probably come down to which
scheme can raise the cash first and get on with construction.
However, at the time of writing (February 2016) there seems to be no
news of any progress on this development either.

Studio
81, Leeds

Not
far from the old Yorkshire TV studios in Kirkstall Road is Studio 81.
This business opened in 2006 and has hosted a number of TV drama
productions. These include Wuthering Heights, Lost in
Austen, White Girl, The Chase, Strictly Confidential, Red Riding, 5
Days, South Riding, Sirens, The Damned United, The Syndicate, DCI Banks,
Just Henryand
the extraordinary
Peaky Blinders,

There
is one very large stage of 230 x 70ft plus workshop facilities and
all the usual offices, dressing rooms and wardrobe/makeup rooms.

Yorkshire
Studios,Church
Fenton (between York and Leeds)

RAF
Church Fenton was created in 1937 when the air force was carrying out
a massive expansion, due to the increasing threat from Hitler's
Germany. It was designed as a fighter base, defending the
industrial areas of Leeds, Bradford and Sheffield. As well as
housing normal RAF squadrons it was also the home of the first RAF
Eagle squadron of American volunteers.

After
the war it remained a fighter base with the new generation of jets
such as the Meteor and the Hunter. In 1959 the base scaled back
its operation, becoming used for training on a wide variety of
aircraft types over the following decades. Following the 2010
defence review, training was sadly (some might say unwisely)
drastically scaled back in the RAF and the base was no longer
required. It closed in December 2013 and was handed over to
property investor Makin Enterprises.

In
June 2015, Screen Yorkshire announced that it had secured the rights
to create a new film studio based here at Church Fenton. They
have 3 hangars to be used as stages - two at 36,000 sq ft and one at
30,000 sq ft. All have a useful height of 40ft. The
complex includes office space, workshops and plenty of parking.
There is also a great deal of concreted space near the buildings
previously used for aircraft handling as well as grassed over areas
with clear vistas where exterior sets can be built.

On top
of the UK-wide tax breaks, Screen Yorkshire has available the
'Yorkshire Content Fund' which can be used to attract TV dramas and
features to the area. They say that in excess of £1m can
be invested in suitable projects. Since 2012 and prior to these
studios opening, over £21m has been invested in various dramas
including Peaky Blinders and Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell.

This
is all very positive and very much to be welcomed. (Once again,
it makes the situation in Scotland look even worse.) In October
it was announced that Mammoth Screen's ITV drama Victoria will
be the first production to shoot at this facility. Starring
Jenna Coleman, filming is scheduled to last until about April 2016.

As
will be explained below, Manchester has long been recognised as a
centre of creative talent in music, drama and comedy. As a
result, a number of programmes are being made there now with a desire
to reflect this on network television. This has resulted of
course in a new studio centre being constructed in the fashionable
and trendy area of Salford Quays. These MediaCity studios
opened in 2011 but whilst they were being planned and constructed a
few enterprising companies opened studios in other parts of
Manchester. The most recent is The Sharp Project, another is
the Pie Factory - see below - but before them was Web Studios...

a
typical set under construction in one of the stages at Web Lighting

with
thanks to the Web Lighting website

Web
Studios
are an offshoot of Web Lighting - a hire company who decided that
they could offer studio facilities that didn't seem to be readily
available in the area. They are based in Little Hulton, about 6
miles north west of MediaCity.

They
presently have three sound stages of 5000sq ft, 18,850sq ft and
19,250 sq ft. The largest 'C' stage was built only a few years
ago and is described as a 'state of the art' soundstage. It
even contains a tank. Amongst several other showsNew
Street Law,Waking
the Dead, Inspector Lynley Mysteries,
the
sci-fi comedy series Hyperdrive
and Avalon/BBC comedy opera series Kombat
Opera
have been made in these studios. Commercials and pop promos
form a large part of their work.

The
Pie Factory

Early
in 2007 a new facility opened next door to the MediaCity site in
Salford Quays called The
Pie Factory.
This is a studio complex that was originally a pie factory. No
really. It has three 'studios' (I would prefer to call them
stages) curiously named after northern towns. 'Salford Studio'
is 3,000 sq ft, 'Leeds Studio' is 5,500 sq ft and the largest
'Manchester Studio' is 6,800 sq ft. They have already made a
number of single camera TV productions including The
Visit, Cold Blood,
Drop
Dead Gorgeous and
Boy A.

The
Pie Factory is part owned by the Peel Group, the company that built
the huge MediaCity complex. It was thought that by opening
these studios a clientele of production companies would build up over
the years leading to the opening of the four main multicamera studios
in the new building in 2011. The Pie Factory has remained in
business even after the MediaCity studios opened, providing
complimentary single camera facilities.

In
2008 Manchester Island was added to the cluster of studios
owned by the Island group along with a couple of studios in South
Africa and Duke's Island and Black Island in west London. They
are all owned by Panalux so not surprisingly, Manchester Island is
situated at Panalux Manchester's base in Kearsley, Bolton. They
have a single 5,500 sq ft. stage which is 114 x 48ft. It has a
semi-permanent cyclorama.

stage
2 in the Sharp Project

with
thanks to the Sharp Project website

In
2010 The Sharp Project, located in Newton Heath, north-east
Manchester, was handed £6.3 million pounds by the Northwest
Regional Development Agency and the European Regional Development
Fund helping them to turn the former Sharp electronics factory into a
'digital production complex' that provides a range of sound stages,
scenery storage areas, office and production space. There are
four stages: stage 1 (71 x 52ft), stage 2 (131 x 81ft), stage 3 (81 x
79ft) stage 4 (282 x 106ft). Typically for converted industrial
buildings, they all have relatively low ceilings around 20 -
25ft. The first TV programme shot here was actually Casualty 1909
for BBC1 in 2009 (before the redevelopment) whilst a CBBC series - My
Genius Idea, was filmed here by production company Shine in the
summer of 2010. Comedy drama series Mount Pleasant was
made here by Tiger Aspect for Sky 1 in 2011 and 2012. Other
productions include Fresh Meat (C4), The Making of a Lady
(ITV) Old Jack's Boat (CBeebies) and The Gadget Show
(North One TV for C5).

A
number of media companies are now based here. The Sharp
Project has several converted shipping containers inside the building
that it lets out as office space for small and startup creative
businesses. There are currently 32 of them and more will be
added as the demand grows.

In
May 2013 it was announced that no less than four sound-proofed green
screen studios have been built here. These are in addition to
the existing stages and range in size from 450 sq ft to 1,270 sq ft.

In
October 2013 work commenced on turning a former Fujutsu factory into
yet another 4-waller studio complex - this one is called The Space Project.
It is in Gorton, about three miles from the Sharp project on the
east side of Manchester. The site is being run by the same
people as the Sharp Project and has been created because they have
had to turn bookings away from their facilities. It opened in
May 2014 and contains 5 stages. These range in size from 8,891
sq ft - 11,194 sq ft. Very specific dimensions there! It
is described as 'high quality but affordable.'

This
facility is aimed at TV drama and single camera comedy, rather than
commercials or multi-camera productions. The first booking was
from CBBC drama World's End, which took over stages 4 and
5. Other productions have included Sky's Mount Pleasant,
Danny Baker's autobiography Cradle to Grave for BBC2, Boy
Meets Girl for the BBC and No Offence for C4. Big
Talk's 10 part drama Houdini and Doyle occupied two stages for
much of 2015 and Sky 1's sitcom Rovers was also shot here.
ITV's Cold Feet will be made here in 2016.

Having
said that multicamera productions are not made here, in fact the
13th series of Dragon's Den was another booking in April 2015
- although this show is shot using several cameras simultaneously
recorded and edited later, rather than vision mixed. The output
of the cameras was sent across Manchester via high speed fibre to
dock10 at MediaCity for post production.

The
stages are as follows:

1
- 140 x 81ft

2
- 133 x 80ft

3
- 104 x 98ft

4
- 104 x 98ft

5
- 98 x 92ft

Stages
1 and 2 are a useful 31 feet high but the rest are only 21ft high,
which could limit the kind of sets that can be built. The site
also contains a workshop, prop store and all the usual dressing room
and production office facilities. The stages have acoustic
treatment to the walls and roof, I-beam lighting grids and air
conditioning. These facilities are certainly not all found in
some of the more basic 4-waller studios elsewhere.

In
September 2015, plans were announced to expand - including a 30,000
sq ft stage with workshops and business units. This is now
under construction and is part of the 6.5 hectare 'Outer Space' which
includes support facilities such as lighting storage.

Above - The Space Project as
planned. Below - the finished product..

Now in
case you hadn't noticed, around 2003 there appeared to be a dawning
realisation that almost all the programmes shown on the UK's main
broadcast channels were being made in London. The reasons for
this can be argued, but the fact is that both ITV and the BBC spent
the 1990s closing down almost all of their regional production
studios - so it was hardly surprising. Simply put, they were
not attracting sufficient work to enable them to pay their way.

However,
the pendulum began to swing back and it became the aim of the BBC,
ITV and C4 to make a greater proportion of programmes outside the
M25. This was mostly of course due to pressure from the
government and Ofcom for the TV companies to represent the culture of
the whole country rather better than they were. There was in my
view a confusion here. Focus groups were saying that the BBC in
particular was too London-centric. I think what people were
saying was that programme content was too much based on the culture
of London and the south east. I doubt that many were commenting
on where the studios were located in which the programmes were made.

The
BBC seemed to embrace this need for change rather more
enthusiastically than the other companies - possibly sensing that
property is a lot cheaper 'up north' than in London and in 2008 they
announced an intention to make half of all their programmes outside
London by 2016.

In
fact, the BBC had indicated in 2004 that they intended to move
various departments to Manchester and a proposed development by Peel
Holdings (now called The Peel Group) in Salford Quays was selected as
a new base in 2006. Thus the BBC became 'anchor tenants', Peel
obtained detailed planning permission in 2007 and the rest, as they
say, is history. Read on...

MediaCityUK
-
Salford (dock10)

With
a name as grand as this you know that they must have been planning
something big. Well - they were. Since we are on the
subject allow me to quote their website...

'MediaCity
is all about connections: connections with people, places,
emotions, audiences and technologies. It will ultimately
represent - and redefine - a new
era of global media communications'

You
get the picture. In fact, here is a picture...

This
photo was on the BBC's website. Quite interesting that that is
where I found probably the most unflattering image of this centre on
the Internet.

Beauty
is, as they say, in the eye of the beholder. The collection of
buildings seen above that make up MediaCity is apparently not exactly
admired in the world of architecture. MediaCity won the
'Ugliest Building in the UK' award of 2011 in Building Design
magazine's annual Carbuncle Cup contest. Amongst many
unflattering remarks, the editor commented 'Quite how the BBC has
stooped this low is hard to fathom.' Ah well. No Grade II
listing with special status imminent here I suspect. A bit
unfair too on the BBC who played no part in the design of all this.

Personally,
I think that criticism is a bit harsh. Having worked in the
place myself, I think it looks OK - it's a little bleak and wind-swept
but the mix of architectural styles in the various blocks and
buildings does make it seem somewhat less 'planned' than some
developments. It does however look a bit as though a room full
of architects have all gone off into separate corners and designed
their building without looking at what everyone else was doing - but
I assume that's the effect they wanted.

Despite
the size of the whole project, the number of medium/large TV studios
is only four, (of which one is only 4,550 sq ft - the BBC's TV Centre
in White City of course having eight, five of which were between
8,000 and 10,000 sq ft.) Some people have compared this
development with TV Centre but this is misleading.
Nevertheless, it has become the base for several thousand people
working in television, radio and other media and has affected the
industry in various ways.

Many
people believe that this is a BBC development. Not so. (Please
remember this - I'll be testing you later.) Well, only partly
so. The BBC have of course moved several departments here from
London including Radio Five Live, BBC Children's Department and BBC
Sport. All of these were based at Television Centre in White
City. However, none of these departments made much use of the
five largest production studios at the Centre so the move north did
not significantly affect bookings in them. In fact, only one
small studio was used by the Sport department at TVC.
Children's department occasionally booked one other small studio for Blue
Peter - and that's it.

The
timetable was as follows: Blue Peter moved in the summer
of 2011 - with the offices of other shows such as A Question of Sport
and Dragon's Den moving here from BBC Manchester in Oxford
Road between May and July. Many CBBC and CBeebies staff
also moved up from London in this first wave. Between August
and October 2011 was wave 2 which included Newsround and CBBC
drama. Wave 3 was from October 2011 into early 2012 and
finished off most of the move although the date for BBC Breakfast
to begin broadcasting from Salford was 10th April 2012.

The BBC
Breakfast move was particularly controversial as when in London
the show frequently made use of many actors, film stars, musicians,
celebs and politicians who just popped into the studio at TV Centre
at the beginning of the day. It has undoubtedly proved to be
more difficult to persuade these people to make a special trip to
Salford if they are performing in or visiting the capital city - or
indeed for most Members of Parliament who will either be in their own
constituency or in Westminster for most of their time. Without
doubt, the range and quality of studio guests has diminished although
some people are interviewed in London down the line which never works
quite as well.Breakfast
is of course news-based and BBC News moved to brand new studios in
New Broadcasting House in the centre of London - which is where many
people expected the Breakfast show to be based.

It is
hard to fathom the editorial logic in moving this of all shows to
Salford. Two of the regular presenters refused to go as did
just over half the staff working on the show - only 46% officially
deciding to relocate. The programme now shares the Northwest Tonight
regional news studio, which is in one of the BBC office blocks rather
than the main studio building. In my view the look of the show
has suffered - with its low ceiling and scaffold bar grid visible in
every wideshot inevitably making it look rather cheap and second rate
compared with the space and proportions of the set in Television
Centre's TC7. Let's be frank - it looks 'regional' - but then,
I suppose that's what the BBC wanted.

One
does suspect that the fact that this show is made in Salford is
because it represents 195 minutes of airtime Sundays to Fridays and
240 minutes on Saturdays on BBC One which helps to alter the overall
balance of programmes made outside the capital in a simple but
effective manner, whether or not it is the right programme to be made
there. Let's face it - it helps to tick a box. What would
have made far more sense would have been for The One Show to
be based here and Breakfast to occupy the One Show's
studio at Broadcasting House. All the outside activities TheOne
Show loves to do would have worked far better in the huge piazza
here, which is private, self contained and would annoy nobody.
The BBC office staff and news department at BH must tear their hair
out every day at being disturbed by rock stars, West End musical
performers or drummers rehearsing and performing in the small
courtyard outside the main entrance. It would of course have
been even better based at Television Centre, but that's another
story. However, The One Show only runs for half an hour
on weekdays (60 mins on Weds) so where would the rest of the regional
quota time be made up?

The
BBC has declared that it intends to make 50% of all its programmes
outside the capital by 2016. This includes drama (much of which
is now made in Wales) entertainment and comedy. Although BBC
Entertainment and BBC Comedy are remaining based in London there is
now also a BBC Comedy North department based here. They are
therefore making some programmes here - mostly in studio HQ2 - which
in previous years would have been made in London. Well, I say
that... Apart from Citzen Khan it's hard to think of any other
BBC Comedy shows made in these studios.

The
development has been built (not by the BBC - did I mention that?) by
the Peel Group, who describe themselves as a leading property and
transport organisation. They began in textiles in the 1920s in
Lancashire. As the textile industry declined, they moved into
retail warehousing and property development. Later they
acquired the Manchester Ship Canal and its port facilities. The
Trafford Centre was completed by them in 1998. They own several
airports in the north of England and in 2003 acquired Clydeport,
Scotland's main sea port. In 2005 they took over Mersey Docks,
making them the largest owner of dockyards in the UK. In 2007
they gained ownership of about a quarter of UK Coal plc. So -
an impressive portfolio of businesses in the world of ports,
airports, property development, retailing and even coal mining.
However, no previous experience in the world of television - unless
they have chosen not to state that on their website. They have
however created a new division - Peel Media - to administer this
development. Interestingly, in the summer of 2011 Peel expanded
their influence in the world of media by purchasing
Pinewood-Shepperton. Make of that what you will.

MediaCity
consists of several buildings - three of which are leased by the
BBC. However, the main studio block is separate and for a while
it was assumed that the TV studios here would be operated by
3sixtymedia, the company that ran ITV's old Granada studios.
More on this later.

There
are three small studios on the first floor of the studio building
that were built for the use of CBBC and CBeebies. Studio
HQ7 is 49 x 33 ft wall to wall and studios HQ5 and HQ6 are both 41 x
24 ft wall to wall. HQ5 and HQ6 are the homes of CBeebies
presentation and CBBC presentation and Newsround. HQ7
is the Blue Peter studio and is roughly half the size of TC2
- the small studio they had been using at TV Centre for the previous
few years. No room for marching bands or elephants in here
sadly. No room for much at all in fact. There was also at
the planning stage an area designated 'Blue Peter Garden' - but this
was on a roof, so not quite what we had been used to. No more
burying of time capsules, obviously. I gather some rehearsals
were done on the roof and it proved to be quite windy. Who'd
have imagined? The BP garden is therefore now tucked
away on the edge of a landscaped area right next to one of the
MediaCity tram stop platforms. The 'Italian sunken garden' (pond) was
moved stone by stone from Shepherds Bush to its new location along
with Petra's statue.

The
peaceful oasis of the new Blue Peter Garden - right next to the
MediaCityUK tram stop. That sound you can hear in the
background is Percy Thrower rotating in his grave.

Incidentally,
dotted around the landscaped area and the open piazza are a number
of stainless steel bollards containing fibre links and some power,
enabling cameras to be set up pretty well anywhere around the site
and controlled by one of the studio production galleries. This
has proved to be useful on several occasions and is one of the few
things one can genuinely say have been well thought-out with this
development. For example, Gok Live: Stripping for Summer
(C4) used this facility to great effect in 2013 combining studio with
live OB from the piazza.

BBC
Sport has its production offices with editing and communications
facilities and its BBC Sports Centre studio in one of the BBC
buildings. Many of their studio links are done on location at
OBs - but some programmes such as Match of the Day use HQ3,
the smallest of the main four MediaCity (dock10) studios.

So,
to summarise the facilities...

The
studio block has three small studios on the first floor (HQ5, HQ6
and HQ7) - and on the ground floor, four medium to large TV studios
(HQ 1-4) and two audio studios, one of which is the home of the BBC
Philharmonic Orchestra. This is very large - effectively a
concert hall - and includes audience seating.

Three
of the TV studios are almost identical in size and shape to studios
6, 8 and 12 at Granada's Quay Street building. (4,550 sq ft,
6,300 sq ft and 7,650 sq ft respectively.) The reason for this
may in some way relate to the non-competition agreement made by the
BBC and ITV when they formed 3sixtymedia back in 2000. However,
I'm afraid what seems more likely is that they simply copied what
already existed at the old Granada studios because nobody had a
better idea and didn't have the nous to ask current programme-makers
what they considered would be the most useful sizes. (Can
you confirm the actual reason? If so, do let me know!)

Of
particular interest is Studio HQ1 - a very large room
officially stated to be 12,543 sq ft. Its dimensions are 124 ft
x 90 metric ft within firelanes. That's about the same width as
TC1 or Fountain but 24 feet longer than TC1 and 10 feet shorter than
Fountain. Who this was intended for is anyone's guess.
Since even studio 12 at Granada sat empty for most of the time over
its final ten or more years there didn't seem to be an obvious demand
for large TV studios in Manchester. Indeed, for the first 2
years of operation after MediaCity opened, HQ1 was dark for much of
the time.

I
have heard that the BBC asked for a large studio to be included when
they thought that TV Centre would be closing. Apparently, a
producer in the Entertainment department at that time requested a
studio at least as big as TC1 for shows like Strictly Come Dancing
if TV Centre was no longer to be available. However, the 2011
series of Strictly did not move into this studio as expected
by some but remained in TC1 at Television Centre in London as did the
2012 series. In 2013 and 2014 it was made in the George Lucas
stage at Elstree. In fact, my understanding is that the BBC
Entertainment Dept have no intention of moving Strictly away
from London.

It
is also possible that the BBC needed to be sure that they would have
access to a large studio for the coverage of general elections/Children
in Need/Comic
Relief
etc after the closure of TV Centre. Of course, things have
since moved on. Television Centre did close in March 2013 but
the BBC Studios business is now using BBC Elstree D for elections and Children
in Need plus three stages at Elstree Studios until the summer of
2017. Then they will move back to TVC and occupy three of the
studios there (and possibly continue to use Elstree Studios stages 8
and 9 as well as their own Elstree D over the road). In any
case, as previously mentioned, the BBC have no direct connection with
these studios but are simply clients like any other company.

Well
- not quite. In the early stages of planning this project,
somebody at the BBC (I wonder who?) signed an agreement with Peel
that commits them to renting a certain amount of studio time over 10
years up to 2020. This is reported to be the not insignificant
sum of £82.8m. (So, a little under half what they sold TV
Centre for.)

Unfortunately,
despite using these studios for quite a few shows that would
previously have been made in their own studios in London, a report by
the National Audit Office found that by September 2012 the BBC had
underspent their commitment by half a million pounds. They
therefore have to spend more in the coming years, not just to catch
up but to pay off the underspend. I have heard (although I
can't prove this) that the underspend is simply being paid to Peel
each year, whether studios have been used or not. Remember,
this is money going to the Peel Group, whereas in the past it was
money going to their own subsidiary BBC Studios and Post Production,
which could be re-invested in constantly improving facilities for
their own use. I have not even mentioned the cost of travel and
accommodation for the various performers, producers and craft heads
of department who are almost entirely still London based. Oh, I
just have. Public money well spent? Well, you decide.

In
January 2011, studio HQ2 (97 x 68ft within firelanes) was the first
to be fully fitted out. However, the first transmittable TV
production to be made in the MediaCity studios was the rather odd
Saturday teatime gameshow Don't Scare The Hare. (Quite a
contrast to the major live spectacular show that heralded the opening
of Television Centre. One does wonder just how great in fact
was the BBC's commitment to the whole MediaCity project.)
Anyway, Don't Scare The Hare was recorded in January in studio
HQ1 - which was in an unfinished state. There was no lighting
rig or any means of suspension installed so the whole studio had to
be equipped with temporary trussing. The gallery suite was not
equipped so the control rooms of HQ2 were used. It was, in
effect, an outside broadcast made on a 4-waller stage.

A
Question of Sport was the first show to be made in HQ2 in
February of that year. Since then, this studio has been booked
by a number of productions including The Sarah Millican Television Programme,
John Bishop's Only
Joking, John Bishop's Britain, In
With The Flynns, Citizen Khan, The Wright Way, the 2012 series of
In It To Win It, The Furchester Hotel and series 2 of House
of Fools.
HQ2 is a useful length but the working area is 4 feet narrower than
TC8 and stages 8 and 9 at Elstree, which can affect the design of
sets that would have fitted comfortably in those studios. (I
really do wonder why they didn't ask the people actually making TV
programmes now what size and shape of studio would work best for most
shows, rather than copying what Granada did in 1958.)

HQ3
(68 x 52ft within firelanes) is the smallest of the main studios and
opened with cameras, lights and a fully equipped grid (hoorah!).
It is used mostly for BBC Sport programmes but CBBC show Justin's House
and Frank Skinner's Opinionated have also been made in
here. The first Match of the Day came from here on Nov
5th 2011. Its gallery suite was also used to drive HQ7, the Blue
Peter studio for many months as that studio's galleries also
remained unequipped until well into 2012.

In
fact for the first 18 months or so of operation only two of the main
studios were fully completed. The flagship studio HQ1 was an
empty shell with no cameras, no lighting hoists and with its gallery
suite unequipped. Sports Personality of the Year came
from here in December 2011 and all the hired-in lights had to be
mounted on temporary trussing. A series of Tonight's The Night
was made here in 2011 and a few editions of A Question of Sport
in 2012.

An
8-part series of Lotto gameshow Who Dares Wins was recorded
in this studio over 3 days in October 2012. This show was
originally recorded at TV Centre, a series was then made at TLS in
London, then two more in BBC Glasgow, then a series in 2011 in studio
12 at 3sixtymedia (Granada) and finally here in HQ1. All the
other studios had fully equipped lighting grids enabling a quick and
relatively inexpensive turnaround but in this studio a huge truss rig
had to be hired in and installed - all for just 3 days' shooting.Question
Time has also used HQ1 but this show carries its own lighting
rig including trussing round the country and is run from an OB unit.

As
you will by now understand, up to the middle of 2013 studio 1 had
not received a large number of bookings because making any programme
in here was relatively costly and time-consuming since it involved
hiring in a load of trussing and lights. However, in 2013 money
was at last found to more or less complete the fitting out of this
studio. In August it was equipped with motorised scene hoists
and lighting bars. However, rather unfortunately, these don't
cover the full working area of the studio in order to save
costs. The area about 12 feet inside the firelanes all round
the studio has no lighting bars above, making the lighting director's
job something of a challenge. Effectively, any set built there
is unlightable unless (guess what) trussing is hired in. So,
the job has been partly done but not exactly finished. Lighting
round the edges of the studio it seems is not considered terribly important.

In
fact, none of the studios here at MediaCity have any way of hanging
lights under the gantries above the firelanes round the sides of the
studio. All other purpose-built TV studios have either a track
running round or motorised bars that can support lights. This
seems to have been quietly forgotten here.

When
it opened, HQ1 had no lights available to be used by productions,
forcing them to hire in whatever they needed. In 2014, 85
Kahoutek dual-source lamps (sometimes called 'twisters') were
purchased from BBC S&PP: ex-TV Centre. These luminaires
are, let's just say, not the first choice of any lighting director I
know. They were originally bought for two of the small studios
at TV Centre many years ago and immediately gained a bit of a
reputation. I don't know how much dock10 paid for them but
let's just say I'll bet BBC S&PP couldn't believe their luck when
they managed to find somebody who actually wanted to buy them.
Needless to say, it is still necessary to hire in many of the lights
required to cover productions in this studio.

Up
until the autumn of 2012 programmes made in HQ1 had to use the
gallery suite of one of the other studios along with that studio's
cameras - meaning of course that it couldn't be used at the same
time. In October/November 2012 the galleries in HQ1 were at
last fitted out, ready for the auditions part of The Voicein
December.
That
show returned the following year and also in 2014.

Other
shows to use HQ1 have included The
British Soap Awards and
Alesha's Street Dance Stars, which
shared the studio with Citizen
Khan for
several weeks in 2013, each show having its set at the ends of the
studio, the audience seating being located in the middle and turned
around to face the right way for each recording. Very ingenious!

HQ4
(76 x 68ft within firelanes) was for many months similarly
unequipped and still remains without motorised lighting bars,
although it has been used much more than HQ1 - mostly for children's
programmes in the first year or so. Lights were hung from
temporary trusses whilst hired-in flyaway kit and rented cameras were
used. CBeebies series Justin's House was one of the
first bookings and Dragon's Den was recorded here in
2012. The galleries were eventually fitted out in the summer of
2012 - some of the kit being brought over from Quay St. In
fact, many of the lights in HQ4 have 'GTV' painted on them - having
been bought by Granada Television many years previously.

The
studio has had a densely packed set of trusses installed. The
light rigs for Countdown, University Challenge, Jeremy Kyle and
Judge Rinder are all semi-permanently rigged but occasionally
dock10 rent HQ4 out to other shows when ITV don't need it.
(In which case I gather that the lighting rig is changed and then
restored afterwards.) I have heard that HQ3 has occasionally
also been used for one of these shows when recording dates clashed.

Interesting
to note that the returning shows ITV North are booking this studio
for are not exactly brand new cutting edge latest ideas in television
entertainment. Judge Rinder - an unashamed copy of long
running US show Judge Judy has recently been added to the mix
but the Jeremy Kyle Show is 10 years old whilst Countdown
began in 1982 and University Challenge in 1962 - over 50 years
ago! Can nobody working 'up north' in ITV now come up with any
original ideas that will last? And, why are no ITV primetime
comedy or entertainment shows made in Salford? Possibly ITV are
not quite as enthusiastic as the BBC to become less London-centric.

Thus
to summarise - by the autumn of 2012, all 7 studios had had their
gallery suites fitted out. Those for the four main studios are
very spacious. The only problem with them is that they are an
astonishing two floors up at gantry level, rather than on the ground
floor which most directors/producers/LDs etc prefer. Not only
that but because of the position of the studio stairs relative to the
doors, you have to walk through the door and then the full length of
the studio before descending - this on a steel staircase that rings
with every step making a quiet nip onto the studio floor
impossible. It's even worse for the director or producer - he
or she has to go out of the production gallery, along the
corridor and into the lighting or sound gallery before making the
lengthy trip to the studio floor. Quite extraordinary.

There
appears to be quite a bit of wasted space on the ground floor of the
building - the foyer is huge - so one does wonder why the architect
was not persuaded to rearrange things a little and build the
galleries at floor level. In any case, Peel do own the land all
around - they could even have made the building slightly bigger and
done the job properly.

Incidentally,
dock10 now own sufficient mobile audience seating units to equip
studios 1 and 2 with audiences of 300 or so. The seats are
quite old and a bit tatty (I gather they are ex-Granada studios) but
perfectly servicable.

In
case you are wondering - 'HQ' apparently stands for 'Harbour Quay.'

Oh,
and if you are wondering what size I think the studios should have
been - I have no strong views on studios 3 and 4 but studios 1 and 2
are definitely the wrong size. There has been no great demand
for the huge size of HQ1 (apart from a few weeks of The Voice
each year) - HQ2 is by far the more popular studio but is too narrow
compared with other similar studios.

They
should both have been identical, giving the studio management
greater flexibility in scheduling but should have been somewhat
longer and wider than the 'standard' 90 x 70 medium studio - thus
encouraging production companies to use these studios rather than
more familiar alternatives in London. I reckon 100 x 80 feet
within firelanes would have been perfect, with possibly one of them
having a few rows of extra audience seating in a balcony along one
wall (sound familiar?)

Back
to the history...

Negotiations
and discussions between Peel Group and ITV North (the main owners of
3sixtymedia) continued throughout 2008 and into 2009. The BBC
were also involved but I gather only at this planning stage regarding
the design of the studio for the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra. My
understanding is that they played no part in the design of the TV studios.

The
studio design was it seems carried out by consultants TSL
Systems. I copied this from their website:
'The
early engagement allowed TSL to advise Peel on the technical and
internal architectural aspects of the design, such that Peel ended up
with a facility that met the requirements of their anchor
tenants. Indeed most of the typical problems such a build would
have encountered in being prepared for broadcast were solved at the
design stage, allowing for completion to occur on time and on budget.'I
can no longer find this statement on their website incidentally.

Reading
between the lines, I can't help but conclude that the priority may
have been to finish on time and on budget rather than fully
consulting with the people who would actually be using the studios,
which might have caused awkward delays and cost overruns. TSL
were originally asked to provide guidance regarding the costs of
building the studios prior to Peel winning the contract to provide
facilities for the BBC. On winning it, Peel approached TSL to
carry out the detailed design. Quite how many currently active
producers, directors, designers, lighting directors, sound
supervisors, scenic supervisors, make-up and wardrobe supervisors,
floor managers and studio managers were shown the proposed plans and
asked their opinion is not known. If you were involved in the
early design and planning I would love to hear more - confidentially
of course.

What
I have heard is that the studios were intended to be fitted out with
all the latest HD and 5.1 kit, making them genuinely state of the art
- as one would expect after all the fanfares. However, the
banking crisis changed everything and early in 2009 the budget for
technical fitting out was severely slashed. Decisions were
taken about what was essential and what was simply nice to have,
which explains why the studios opened with some not having lighting
grids and equipped gallery suites. Remember, apart from the
studio dedicated to their orchestra, the BBC were not involved in any
of these decisions - ITV North were the people who were liaising with
Peel and TSL about the TV studios at this stage.

Although
these studios were designed and built after fifty years'
industry-wide experience of other studio centres, good and bad, there
are several aspects of their design that many people have found
somewhat surprising. For example, gallery suites 2 floors up,
no toilets close to the gallery suites, each studio only having only
one scene dock door - leading onto an internal corridor, no studio
having direct access to outdoors, most dressing rooms not located
close to the studio floors, dimmers on the grid instead of in a
proper dimmer room where they can be easily accessed, and the general
serious lack of storage and props/workshop space. (A quick look
at a plan of Television Centre would reveal how all these problems
could have been solved.)

Look,
it's easy to be critical of this project. Many people in the TV
industry often are, to be honest. It was unwanted by most
production teams who were very happy making programmes in
well-designed, well-equipped studios in and around London. The
move to Salford was a political decision forced on everyone that
introduced additional costs and huge inconvenience to production
companies and the freelancers who work for them.

Frankly,
the obvious thing would have been to build the best designed and
best equipped television studios in the UK so that people were really
keen to make their programmes there - why not? It would not
have cost more to get the shape, size and layout of all the rooms
right. Equipping the studios with flexible kit of the latest
spec was always going to be very costly but frankly, that's what
everyone was expecting after all the fuss that had been made.
To come up with studios that have so many disappointing aspects to
their design that only a brief glance at the original planning
application revealed is astonishing, frankly.

The
expense of travel and accommodation for artistes, members of
production teams and craft Heads of Department digs deeply into the
budget of programmes made in Salford. Peel should have built
studios that everyone is desperate to make their shows in despite the
extra cost, not ones that only get used in order to make up a quota
or if there is no studio available in London.

At
the time ITV North were involved in planning the MediaCity studios,
they were intended to open in 2011 and Granada would then close its
studios in Quay Street. A site for a new building opposite
MediaCity had been earmarked for them to move into so that the Quay
Street offices could also be sold off. However, on 11th March
2009 there was a surprising development. ITV issued the
following press release:

'ITVs
long-mooted move of its Manchester production base to Salford is not
going to happen  meaning that the former Granada site at Quay
Street will continue to be home to Coronation
Street and other shows.

Discussions
have taken place over several years about ITV joining the BBC at the
massive new MediaCity development in Salford.

But
Chief Operating Officer John Cresswell announced to Manchester staff
today, during a visit to Quay Street, that negotiations with
MediaCity developer the Peel Group have broken down.

In
a statement, ITV said: "ITV can confirm that negotiations with
the Peel Group over the possible move of the broadcaster's Manchester
operation to MediaCity in Salford broke down this week after the
developer dramatically scaled back its financial commitment to the
ITV element of the project."

"As
a result, ITV will remain at its Quay Street base for the
foreseeable future."

John
told Manchester staff that the focus would now be on ensuring that
the Quay St building is fit for purpose.'

This
decision initially appeared to leave the opening of the studios in
some doubt. If ITV/3sixtymedia were no longer involved and with
the Peel Group severely scaling back its investment then would all of
the studios be completed? Peel already had a commitment from
the BBC that they would book a certain amount of studio time so on
this basis (apparently £82.8m over 10 years) studios 2 and 3
were fitted out. According to press reports, in April 2009 the
Peel Group were said to be trying to persuade ITV to change their
minds. This was hardly surprising as to make running the
studios financially viable Peel would need regular bookings from them
too. Throughout the following months rumours began to circulate
that ITV might leave Quay St after all.

In
March 2010 Peel announced that they had appointed Andy Waters as Head
of Studios. Andy is a decent chap who has a great deal of
experience as a resource manager at BBC TV Centre. He also has
a long list of industry contacts so is no doubt trying to persuade
many of them to make their shows here rather than in London.
Within a few months several other resource managers from TV Centre
joined him - possibly the uncertain future of TVC helped in this
decision. Whatever their reasons, although some aspects of the
studios' design might not be what they would have chosen had they
been involved at the planning stage, I know that they are all
determined to make this studio centre a popular and happy place to
make programmes. My experience working in the studios so far
has been very good. The support from the studio management team
was excellent and my electricians crew were young, relatively
inexperienced but extremely hard working and with a very positive
attitude. It was a genuine pleasure working with them.

Some
good news is that the studio management team were successful over the
first two or three years of operation in persuading their
shareholders to invest in a range of equipment and facilities,
enhancing the attractiveveness of the studios. It is no secret
that when they opened, the studios were disappointingly equipped and
in many ways unfinished. This reputation quickly spread round
the industry and did a great deal of harm. The investment that
has since taken place has certainly improved things. It will
not necessarily pay for itself directly but by making the studios a
more attractive place to work will pay off in the long run.

Meanwhile,
rewinding back to November 2010, SIS (part of which used to be BBC
OBs) was given a 10 year contract to supply the studios with camera,
sound and engineering crews. They used to operate the studio at
the BBC Media Village in White City that produced The One Show.
Thus 'The Studios' at MediaCity became a joint venture between Peel
Media and SIS.

A
familiar object, inexplicably located in the foyer of the dock10
studio block. Since these studios are not owned by the BBC and
have no connection with Dr Who, one does wonder quite who is
trying to fool whom. And why?

Note
all the wasted space that could have been used to build gallery
suites by re-arranging things within the building.

On
16th December 2010 it was confirmed that ITV would indeed be moving
to MediaCity, after many months of discussions and negotiations.
The office staff and local news are now occupying several floors of
the Orange tower which is the block that also houses the University
of Salford. The first local news broadcast from the new studio
was on 25th March 2013. As it happens, I have visited the ITV
news studio. As in most converted office studios the ceiling is
much too low so most of the lights, instead of hanging properly from
the grid scaffold bars, are tilted to one side and pushed up against
the ceiling. That doesn't look great frankly.

On
the other side of the water a 7.7 acre site next to the Imperial War
Museum is now the base for Coronation Street. A
production block, two TV studios and a larger exterior set than
currently used have been built and opened at the beginning of 2014.

The
Coronation St site seen from MediaCity across the Manchester
Ship Canal. Foreground left is one of the two studios, the
production block can just be seen on the left of frame and the new
exterior set is just visible behind the car park.

The
studios in the main Peel block are now being used for ITV's other
productions (eg Jeremy Kyle, Countdown, University Challenge),
which of course was the intention when the centre was originally
designed. It was thought that the move to studio 4 would happen
in the autumn of 2012 but in fact it was early in 2013 - Countdown
being the first ITV show to use HQ4 in January. The
Coronation St site took far longer to build than anticipated due
apparently to some construction issues with the main 4-storey
production block. I am told that bemused MediaCity workers
watched it rise in 2012 only to be dismantled and begun all over again.

What
this does mean is that at least three of the four main TV studios now
have regular bookings from ITV and BBC North. This places the
operation of the centre on a much more secure foundation. In an
interview in 2012 Andy Waters predicted that the centre would be
running at 'full capacity' by 2013. This (according to
Broadcast magazine) represents utilisation of 50%-60% which is the
best he believes can be practically achieved.

In
September 2012 it was announced that 'The Studios' at MediaCity would
be rebranded as 'dock10'. Possibly this was in response to the
widely held but erroneous belief in the industry that the studios
here are owned and run by the BBC. They are not. But you
know that now, don't you?

Old
BBC production studios outside London

It
wasn't that long ago - well, the early 1990s - that the BBC had a
medium sized production studio in three regional centres in
England. Five if you include the somewhat smaller one in
Newcastle and even smaller studio in Southampton. The rest were
in Bristol, Manchester and the one that everyone over 30 remembers -
Pebble Mill in Birmingham. Who could forget Pebble
Mill at One? Even if you never
saw it you'd heard of it. In point of fact, it came from the
foyer of the building, not its main studio but who cares? It
ran from 1973-1986 - with Donny McCloud, Marion Foster, Bob Langley,
Jan Leeming, Judi Spiers, Peter Seabrook and a dozen or so other
presenters who came and went. Well, they've all gone now, the
building is a pile of dust and the BBC's Birmingham operation is from
somewhere called the Mailbox - although there is no production studio
there, just a small regional newsroom. That's progress.

Pebble Mill

R.I.P.

Birmingham's
studio A was the home of dozens of popular dramas - All
Creatures Great and Small, Howards Way, Juliet Bravo, Oliver
Twist, Great Expectations, David Copperfield, Jane Eyre, Vanity
Fair, Bird of Prey, and A Very
Peculiar Practice are some examples -
but many light entertainment shows were made here too including Pot
Black, Beadle's About, Call My Bluff, Telly Addicts, Can't
Cook Won't Cook, The Basil Brush Show and(who could forget?)
Emu's Broadcasting Corporation.Of
course, there was also Saturday Night at the Mill and the
unimaginatively named Pebble Mill - the show that took over
from Pebble Mill at One (I hope you're following all
this.) High/low point of that series was undoubtedly Paul
Shane's rendering of 'You've Lost That Loving Feeling' in 1996.
A
quick visit to YouTube is highly recommended.

The
studio opened in 1971 and was 74ft x 64ft within firelanes, so quite
a bit smaller than the medium/large studios at TV Centre. It
opened with four EMI 2001 cameras which were replaced in 1983 with
five Link 125s. In 1992 Pebble Mill bought four Sony BVP-370
studio cameras and two BVP-70 portable cameras. In November
1997 work began on a major refurbishment of the studio. It included a
new production control room complete with 36-channel vision mixer,
new lighting/vision control room and re-equipped sound control room
with new Calrec Q-series 60-channel desk. This £2.2
million upgrade took nine weeks and Studio A re-opened by the end of
February 1998 as a fully digital widescreen facility complete with
new Sony BVP-500 and BVP-550 cameras.

Despite
this huge investment it was announced only two years later at the
end of 2000 by Greg Dyke, the then Director General of the BBC, that
the main studio at Pebble Mill would close. (Quite a different
philosophy from that now in fashion where programmes are being moved
from London to the nations and regions.) Staff at Pebble Mill
are said to have protested most strongly and suggested 'mothballing'
the studio for a year in anticipation of the CBBC department needing
a studio. Despite their best efforts and the very recent £2.2
million refit and upgrade the BBC chose to close Studio A for
good. It's perhaps worth noting that a year later the
Corporation spent £1.7 million upgrading studio D at Elstree for
CBBC. So 'rationalisation' got under way at Pebble Mill and the
next year Studio A was de-commissioned.

The
following little tale will possibly come as no surprise.
It seems that the week after Studio A had closed, Country File
had a massive story which required studio space. Despite the
fact that Studio A was at that time still fully equipped, the studio
was prohibited from being used as it was 'officially closed'.
The production team therefore had to hire in an OB unit and use the
'conservatory studio' once used by Anne and Nick for their daytime show.

Incidentally
- one claim to fame for studio A is that it was the home of a new
kind of floor paint. For many years all studio floors had been
painted with water-based paint, with disastrous consequences if any
liquid was spilled on it! Before a new colour or pattern could
be applied, the floor had to be washed and dried with special
machines. This wasted valuable time during studio
turn-arounds. At Pebble Mill they developed 'Pebble Mill
Peelable' paint, which did what it said on the can. This
enabled the next floor to be painted on top of the old one, layer
after layer, until it grew so thick that the cameras were bumping
over the irregularities, at which time it was simply peeled off.
Brilliant. Job done.

As
with all the regional 'Network Production Centres', Pebble Mill also
had a studio B for local news and sport. This one was 40 x 25ft.

The
Pebble Mill studios were originally intended to have a third 'drama'
studio - studio C - but this was never built. The foyer became
the third studio instead, releasing studio A to make popular
dramas. At first the foyer borrowed the galleries of studios A
and B but in 1983 'gallery C' was commissioned.

Pebble
Mill at One ended in 1986 but in 1988, Daytime Live was
launched. Essentially the same as Pebble Mill at One, it
started at a different time and therefore had a different name.
This show also came from the foyer - now officially called 'studio C'
- and was joined in 1992 by Good Morning with Anne and Nick
which used a small area of this same studio. Needing a bit more
elbow room, it wasn't long before the construction of a conservatory
studio within the courtyard area was completed and Anne and Nick
moved in. Both programmes were controlled from Gallery C.

The
daytime drama series Doctors was also made at Pebble Mill
between 2000 and 2004. Despite the fact that there was a
perfectly good television studio sitting empty, they weren't allowed
to use it, so the windows of the foyer (studio C) were blacked out
and that became the studio - with all its limitations. A
decision such as this clearly makes perfect sense if you are a very
senior BBC manager. Doctors also used an additional
space - radio Studio 1. This was 62 x 44ft wall to wall.

Studio
1 began as the main audio/music studio at Pebble Mill with enough
space to accommodate a full symphony orchestra. Initially, it
was used for sound recording sessions plus the twice weekly live
broadcasts for Radio 3's lunchtime concerts. However, as well
as radio this studio was equipped with a basic lighting grid and was
used in its early years for the occasional television programme.
The studio lighting became controlled from gallery 'C' from the
summer of 1983.

However,
John Birt's 'Producer Choice' agenda in the early 1990's forced
Pebble Mill to charge unrealistic rental rates for the studio and
thus ensured that Studio 1 became too expensive for radio use.
Therefore Radio 3 moved out to Adrian Boult Hall in the centre of the
city, with the newly developed BBC Resources turning Studio 1 into a
full-time TV studio. A scene dock door was added together with
the installation of a more comprehensive lighting grid.

Soon
after, Studio 1 was in daily use for the live transmission of
The Really Useful Show. This lasted for three series, but
I'm told that the long acoustic reverberation characteristics of the
studio were not idea for TV sound. Programmes to originate from
Studio 1 included Daily Live, Anything You Can Cookand
Front Room. As mentioned above, in its final years Studio 1
was used as a sound stage for Doctors, although the associated
radio cubicle continued to be used to produce Radio 4's Farming
Today until the closure of Pebble Mill as a whole (in May 2004).

With
the main TV studio closed and the orchestra having moved out it
wasn't long before somebody decided that they might as well close the
whole place down. Local news and radio went to a building
in the city centre called the Mailbox (or 'shoebox' as apparently the
staff call it) and Doctors is now filmed at the 'BBC Drama
Village' on the University of Birmingham campus at Selly Oak.

Pebble
Mill opened in 1971, made its last broadcast from studio B in May
2004 and was demolished in 2005.

thanks
to Mike Emery for much of the above info.

Postscript:Just
when you thought it was all over... in October 2011 the BBC
announced that as part of their 'Delivering Quality First' cuts they
were planning to move factual programming away from Birmingham to
Bristol by the end of 2012. At one time it looked as though Doctors
would be moving too but that now seems relatively secure. Thus,
no peaktime network programming is currently made in England's second
biggest city.

Bristol's
studio A was the home ofTony
Hart's various art-based series as well asAnimal
Magic, The Really Wild Show, Why
Don't You... and several other popular shows made by the
Children's and Schools departments.

Mike
Emery has written to inform me that the advent of colour in the
region at the start of the 1970s led to colour programmes being
made in Studio A from 1972 in conjunction with the West regions
CMCR3 OB scanner. Also designated SW4 the scanner provided the
necessary colour control room facilities together with its Philips
PC-60 (LDK-3) cameras, which could always be recognised by their
rich, warm tones.

However,
this was not an ideal operation. The OB scanner would be on
the road at the weekend often covering sporting events in the region,
but on a Monday morning the kit was re-rigged in Studio A to provide
the output from the studio - at least until the studio was eventually
refurbished in 1979/80. This included the commissioning of a colour
capable control room suite and four Link 110 cameras. A second
smaller OB unit equipped with three Link 120P cameras was brought
into service around 1977/8. This was often used for the Antiques
Roadshow amongst other things, and allowed the use of the Link
120P cameras in Studio A on an ad hoc basis, albeit generally in
place of a Link 110. In the early 1980s Ikegami HL-79D
cameras replaced the Link 120Ps in the OB unit, and again were
occasionally used in Studio A.

In
1985/6 Studio A was completely refurbished, although the Link cameras
remained. The work included a raised roof and new grid with new
lighting hoists and new sound and communications, together with a new
three machine VTR edit suite with four machine capability. The
studio re-opened in June '86.

Unfortunately,
in a bid to save £25 million, in 1991 the BBC announced a
studio closure programme and Bristols Studio A was one of six
studios around the country that was to close, although much of the
technical equipment was in fact left in situ. Apparently for a
while it was used to house some animals from Bristol Zoo. No, I
don't believe it either but that is what I am told. Can you
confirm this???

Thereafter
Studio A pretty much remained dark until 1996 when another
redevelopment of the site led to part of the studio becoming
the home of the regional news programme Points West which had
previously originated from the tiny 480 sqft Studio B.

David
Croxson has written to inform me that...

'...By
1996, the BBC mooted the idea of merging radio and TV news
operations and Bristol was chosen as the place to try it as both TV
and radio production facilities at the centre were in desperate need
of refurbishment. So what was the scenery workshop became the
bi-media newsroom and Radio studios and what was Studio A became: a
'new' TV studio, a production gallery, multi-format tape dubbing and
TX area, a presentation studio and graphics area. The old
Studio A was partitioned with a stud-wall to create the new gallery
and production areas, but the grid remained intact.

To
this day, the studio is mainly lit with dual-source luminaires
hanging from the 1986 refit barrels. In fact it's still
possible to see the full size of the old Studio A by climbing the
catwalk. Many of the barrels above what is now graphics and
edit suites are still in situ, though obviously they're
disabled. The floor-level hoist and barrel control panels have
the corresponding bits covered up. It's still referred to as
Studio A and the old scene dock doors and studio audience entrance
are still in use.'

David
continues...

'In
2005 when I last explored, the old galleries were still there,
though the technical equipment had long been stripped out and they
were used for storage (mainly of junk). When Points West
moved into Studio A, Studio B closed and has since been
demolished. The area where it used to be is now a part of the
car park.'

I
have never visited myself, but I gather that parts of the BBC Bristol
complex could be described as rather quaint as it is essentially a
couple of streets' worth of attractive Victorian mansions all knocked
together. These old houses are to the right of the 1980s
building shown in the photo above. I am told that it has a
genteel but rather higgledy piggledy feel as you walk from one house
to the next, with grand staircases rising every so often to offices
above. Studio A is in what was once the back gardens of the two
houses at the junction of the Tyndalls Park and Whiteladies
Roads. It had a scene dock and scenery workshop next door and a
couple of quite cramped gallery control rooms in the 1st floor of
these houses. Studio B was a much smaller space and was used
for the local news programme Points West and sport.

Of
course Casualty was based in Bristol from 1987 (the first
series was recorded at TV Centre.) However, it was not made in
these studios but in a converted industrial unit elsewhere in the
city. The show moved to the new BBC Wales Drama Centre in
Cardiff in the autumn of 2011 - a very unpopular move with many people.

Manchester's
Oxford Road studio A opened in 1976 with four EMI 2005 cameras - the
only BBC studio to have the misfortune to be equipped with them.
Actually, not quite. Stephen Neil has informed me that BBC
Norwich had to suffer them too and Robin Vanags recalls them being at
BBC Plymouth.where they were in use from about 1975 - 1988.

When
an Ikegami HL-79D portable camera complemented studio A's EMI 2005s
in 1980 I am told that the pictures from it were such good quality
they had to be downgraded by the vision engineers so they would match
the rather dubious images produced by the EMIs. However, I have
been contacted by Mike Renshall who worked with these cameras and
doesn't remember it like this. He reckons the 2005s were pretty
good - just like 2001s but with 3 tubes rather than 4.
Certainly no worse than the Link 110 which was mechanically poorly
manufactured. Well - maybe. The view I have heard mostly
expressed is that the 2005 produced soft, muddy pictures and one
would have expected it to be an improvement on the 2001, not a
backwards step.

The
studio was initially only 66 x 53 feet within firelanes so quite a
bit smaller than Pebble Mill's studio A. The small size of the
studio proved to a be a problem - limiting the range of shows that
could be made here. In 1989 an 18 month project was begun to
lengthen the studio. The area under construction extended into
what had previously been part of the car park and increased the
length of the studio by nearly 40ft. As well as increasing the
floor area the height of the studio in the new section was raised
too, increasing its volume by some 80%. A new 28ft high cyc
rail was installed in the newly constructed end of the studio
enabling wide camera angles to be used without shooting off the top
of the cyclorama. Once complete, Oxford Road Studio A became
the largest BBC studio outside London, at 94 x 66ft within firelanes.

Whilst
the refurbishment was going on, productions moved to a temporary
studio at Brunswick Dock in Liverpool where they made two
series of the kids show On The Waterfront, the BAFTA Craft
Awards for 1988 and a few sequences for Red Dwarf, amongst
other things.

The
£6 million re-build and refurbishment was completed by May
1991. The old EMIs were replaced by four new Ikegami HK-355
studio cameras and three HK-355P lightweights.

Although
the first programme to use the 'new' studio A was Saturday morning
kids show The 8.15 from Manchester, that show had in fact had
a 22 week series the year before using the scene dock between studios
A and B as a studio. Alan Yardly, director, has written to me
quite rightly pointing this out. Props cages were draped with
tinsel, and one area was turned into a very effective stage upon
which all the top pop bands of the day performed. This area
became known as studio D. The scenery in the scene dock was
shifted into Studio B on a Friday night, then moved back out again
later on the Sunday.

For
many years studio A specialised in entertainment and comedy. It
was the home of Michael Rodd's Screen Test, some series
of Record Breakers, yoof programme The Oxford
Road Show, The Travel Show, Cheggers Plays Pop,Open
Air, Fax, Jossy's Giants, A Question of Pop, That's Showbusiness
with Mike Smith ('91-'96) and The Sunday Show ('95-'97).
Bob Monkhouse's gameshow Wipeout came from studio A before
moving to Granada's Quay St studios andthe first series of Pass
the Buck was also made here in 1998. Its most famous
sitcom was probably Red Dwarf (after
the first few series this moved to Shepperton) but one of its other
shows - A Question of Sport
- is still going strong, having subsequently been made at Granada
(3sixtymedia) or sometimes at TV Centre then becoming one of the
first shows to be recorded in the new MediaCity studios in Salford.

Unfortunately
studio A was another victim of the Director General's red pen and it
closed in 2000. The BBC and ITV formed a new company -
3sixtymedia - to run studio operations in Manchester, with ITV having
an 80% stake and the BBC 20%. The BBC's studio staff, or some
of them at least, found themselves walking up the road to the great
rival Granada to become part of the new business.

Studio
B (2,500 sq ft), continued in use for regional news and sport
programmes crewed by BBC staff. Studio A was closed completely
but curiously the scene dock area - studio D - continued in use for The
Heaven and Earth Show through to 2004 which was broadcast live
on Sunday mornings. These programmes were crewed by
3sixtymedia staff who I'm told particularly appreciated the 6am call time.

Although
studio A closed completely for a few years, in 2005 it became part
of 3sixytmedia's portfolio, albeit as a 4-waller. It was
then used for shooting several single-camera dramas including
both series ofLife
On Mars andChannel 4's Longford.

The
last programme came from Oxford Road on Friday 25th November
2011. It was an edition of North-West Tonight. All
staff left the building and moved to MediaCity during 2012. The
Oxford Road building was demolished in 2013 and the land became a car park.

thanks
to Mike Emery for much of the above info.

BBC
Newcastle

photo
by Gary Richardson

Newcastle's
studio centre was built in the mid 1980s, with the main TV studio A
eventually opening in 1988. The local BBC team moved to these
very smart premises from less than perfect facilities in a very old
building in the city centre. The new base was nicknamed the
'Pink Palace' (see photo above) and contains a production studio of
about 65 x 40ft (2,600 sq ft) that was intended to be used for some
networked programmes as well as local shows.

Rather
than use a TV flooring specialist company, a local contractor was
used. Strange as it may seem, none of the cameramen knew just
how flat the floor should be in the new studio as they had only been
used to the old studio that had ancient floorboards under the
lino. They could tell the new floor was flat...but was it flat
enough??? They decided to call for a cameraman from Television
Centre to come up and test the floor. Unfortunately, every
decent cameraman was busy so they looked around for someone who
wasn't doing much and sent me. No really.

The
year was 1985 and the concrete and asphalt base had just been
laid. It had to be perfectly level so that when the lino was
laid on top there would be no disturbance to the picture when the
cameras tracked across it. When I arrived at the building site
I expected to meet just a couple of BBC suits but what seemed like
the whole of BBC Newcastle plus a dozen or so managers and engineers
from the construction companies were there to meet me. Highly
embarrassed, I felt like the man from Del Monte as I slowly tracked a
camera ped back and forth across the whole surface, looking for
bumps. Not as easy as it sounds, I can assure you. It
only took a couple of hours but I was emotionally drained by the time
we finished. I did find a few little ridges and holes which I
think justified my trip. Funny old world.

The
studio, with its perfectly flat floor, went on to specialise in
Children's programmes including Jackanory and, of course, Byker
Grove. To think that Ant and Dec (or 'PJ and Duncan' as
they were then) trod the floor I had checked. It doesn't get
much better than that.

Local
man Gary Richardson has informed me that other network shows made in
the early days of studio A included the children's gameshow Knock Knock,
the regional contributions to Children In Need, daytime
request show Happy Memories with Cliff Mitchelmore, and the
revival of Juke Box Jury with Jools Holland complete with
studio audience. Jools of course was no stranger to Newcastle
having famously presented The Tube down the road at Tyne Tees
Television on City Road in the 1980's.

During
this period, the studio was also used for the regional magazine
programme Look North when network shows weren't booked.
When A was unavailable, Look North decamped to studio B - a
much smaller space that was designed for the daily regional news
bulletins. It is large enough for two presenters complete with
a scaled down version of the news desk

Around
the turn of the millennium, the studio ceased any pretentions of
being able to make programmes for network TV and was handed over to Look
North on a permanent basis. This saved it from
closure. It had the curious advantage of not being too big - so
it could be used for a programme like this. If it had been
larger like the studios 'A' in Manchester or Birmingham it would
almost certainly have been closed down for good like they were.
On Sundays the studio is also used for the regional version of the Politics
Show. Go to this web address to see a 360 degree image of
the studio with its Look North set...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/tyne/in_pictures/360_panoramas/look_north/

Southampton

David
Croxson has pointed out to me that like Newcastle, BBC Southampton
also contains what could be described as a production studio.
The centre was built slightly later than Newcastle - opening in 1991
- but by the same contractors and within the same BBC climate of
wanting to be able to produce more networked programmes from around
the UK.

Southampton
studio A is slightly smaller than Newcastle's studio at about
1,900 sq ft. The working area is 50 x 36 feet with some
additional space near the scene dock door. It is apparently
audience capable, has a large scene dock and store, separate lamp
store and three dressing rooms. The lighting grid has 60
motorised hoist pantographs on tracks which are also motorised for
moving along the grid (that's clever) with mainly dual-source
lanterns. Again like Newcastle, there is a studio B which was
the original home of the Oxford sub-opt when it started in 2000 but
its cameras went to Oxford when the sub-opt moved there in 2005.
These days studio B is apparently used once or twice a year when A
has its grid safety inspections, but otherwise is used as a meeting room.

Unlike
Newcastle, by the time the studio was commissioned, the idea of
producing programmes from smaller centres was out of favour and only
one networked programme ever came from Southampton - The Midnight Hour
- (unless you know differently!!!). Since then though,
thanks to yet another BBC management idea that after a few years was
quietly forgotten, they've been blessed with an excellent and
somewhat over-specified news studio.

A
corner of Studio A, BBC Southampton. Smart floor!

Around
1988, BBC East in Norwich was also planned to have a similar
sized studio costing £4m which would have enabled the occasional
network programme to be made. It was due to open in 1990.
The plans were publicly announced and featured on the local news
programme. Sadly for them it never happened (another victim of
Michael Checkland's red pen) and instead they moved to The Forum in
Norwich, where only a small news studio was built.

Of
course, the BBC still have regional newsrooms in many major towns in
the country but as far as production studios go there are none
outside London apart from those in Cardiff and Glasgow, with a
4-waller in Belfast. Cardiff's studio A used to be the base for
local soap Pobol y Cwm but that moved to the new drama centre at
Roath Lock in 2011. The studio is now used for Crimewatch UK,
which rather oddly was moved to Cardiff in 2011. I don't know
if the syudio is currently used for anything else - can you
help? still makes programmes for BBC Wales but hardly ever are
any made for the UK versions of BBC1 or BBC2. However, Scotland
is emerging as a new centre for programme making in the UK. The
old BBC Glasgow studios closed in 2007 and a brand new 'state of the
art' HD studio centre opened in a trendy location in Pacific
Quay. This is intended not just to become a programme making
centre for Scotland but also to make comedies and entertainment shows
for the whole of the UK.

There
is incidentally a misunderstanding with some people that the BBC will
be opening new studios at Salford Quays in Manchester in 2011.
There is of course a huge new media centre opening there but the
studios are not owned or operated by the BBC - however they have
signed an agreement to use some of them for a number of days each
year for the next few years. The Corporation will of course be
occupying a great deal of office space there and several departments
are moving to Salford from London and the old Manchester centre.

Current
BBC production studios outside London

BBC
Cardiff

Broadcasting
House, Llandaff

image
thanks to BBC Wales website

The
BBC site at Llandaff was purchased in 1952. The initial
development of 6 sound studios, concert hall, technical block and
offices was completed in 1966. TV studio C2 (1,500 sq ft) came
into service in 1974. This studio is used for local news and
sport programmes. The concert hall mentioned above is also
known as studio A and was large enough to house the BBC Symphony
Orchestra of Wales. This orchestra moved its home to the BBC
Hoddinott Hall at the Wales Millennium Centre in January 2009.

The
main production TV studio, C1, opened in December 1979. It is
80 x 62 metric feet within firelanes, making the studio about
6,500 sq ft overall. The grid has 88 motorised lighting bars
with the usual BBC dual-source lanterns on them (albeit the rather
less popular Kohouteks). The production galleries are spacious
and well equipped and from my experience of working there on a couple
of shows it is a very nice place to make programmes.

studio
C1 in 2014. A very nicely equipped studio not being used for
much at all these days. I wonder how many production companies
even know it exists.

with
thanks to Louis Barfe via Twitter

From
1980 - 2011 the main programme recorded here was Pobol y Cwm
(People of the Valley). This series actually began in 1974 -
making it the BBC's longest-running soap. It was initially
recorded in the BBC's much smaller Cardiff studio in Broadway and
occasionally even in Pebble Mill. It used to be transmitted on
BBC1 Wales but transferred to S4C when that opened in 1982.
Located at the back of the Llandaff building was an exterior set of a
street with some house and shop fronts but all the interiors were
shot in the studio. For many years the programme used the
studio on alternate weeks, allowing other shows to use it then.
Towards the end of its tenure here it was semi-permanently based in
the studio. The soap moved to Roath Lock in autumn 2011.

In
January 2011 Crimewatch UK moved its base to Llandaff.
It had to use the music studio A at first but then transferred to C1
once Pobol y Cwm
had moved to Roath Lock. The set for Crimewatch is now
semi-permanently in the studio. There are 10 live shows each
year plus a few editions of the CW Roadshow which uses the
studio for links. Quite how this makes more economic sense (or
any other sort of sense) than when the programme simply used one of
the studios at TV Centre on a daily basis when required is a mystery
only understood by very senior BBC managers.

The
Pobol y Cwm
set. It was built between two office blocks at the back of the
main building.

Studio
C1 has been home to several popular series over the years.
Most of these have been for transmission on BBC1 Wales or S4C but
highly regarded drama The Life and Times of David Lloyd George
was made here in 1981, drama series District Nurse ('84-'87)
with Nerys Hughes, Tiger Bay ('96-'97) and one series of Terry
and June was famously recorded here when no studio was available
at TV Centre. Mastermind has occasionally been recorded
here for transmission on BBC1. Other series made in English for
BBC1 Wales have included the popular sitcom High Hopes
('02-'08) and musical gameshow The Lyrics Game ('03) - both
suffering from lighting by yours truly.

In
August 2013 the BBC revealed that it would be putting its Llandaff
centre up for sale in the autumn. In January 2015 it was
announced that the building would be sold to Taylor Wimpey, who would
demolish it and build housing. The new site is next to
Cardiff Central rail station in the city centre and is about half the
size of the current building. It will house around 1,200
staff. It will contain no replacement production studio for C1,
just small news/sport studios. Some facilities in the new Welsh
HQ will be shared with S4C - which now gets its funding from the
licence fee. Construction began in December 2015 and the
development will be complete in 2019.

By
coincidence, in the summer of 2013 ITV announced that they too
planned to move their local news operation from Culverhouse Cross to
a new HQ in Cardiff Bay.

Roath
Lock - Cardiff

No
- not the entrance to a theme park or seaside amusement arcade, this
is Roath Lock, the BBC's Welsh Drama Centre. The 'Dr Who
Experience' is the dark blue building at the end of the road.

Chris
Patten, BBC Chairman, described it as looking like a cross between
the Doge's Palace and Ikea. I think he meant that to be a compliment.

Actually,
having seen it myself it is not quite as - well, 'Playschool' - as
it appears in photos. It is certainly striking though.

In
July 2010 work began on the construction of the new BBC Wales Drama
Production Centre. Occupying a large part of the remaining
undeveloped land in the Porth Teigr area of Cardiff Bay this 170,000
sq ft site now houses a number of popular BBC drama series.
Originally called 'Roath Basin', it changed its name to 'Roath Lock'
early in 2011 following consultation with staff. You may draw
your own conclusions.

All
credit due, the first shots were recorded only 14 months after
construction of the studios began - an extraordinarily speedy
process. The studios were officially declared completely open
on March 12th 2012.

Casualty,
a genuine casualty of the BBC's drive to move programme making
around the UK, transferred from its base across the water in Bristol
to these studios during the summer of 2011, the first filming
beginning on 16th September. Pobol y Cwm, the
long-running soap, (longer in fact than EastEnders) moved here
around the end of November from its previous base at the BBC Wales HQ
on the other side of Cardiff in Llandaff. It now has a larger
exterior set and occupies two stages.

Dr
Who was previously made in Upper Boat
Studios - a former seat belt factory on an industrial site at
Treforest, near Pontypridd. The BBC had leased those buildings
since the summer of 2006. That operation moved to the Roath
Lock site early in 2012. The Dr Who
base at Upper Boat provided space for workshops, video editing
suites, six sound stages and a large props store. It was
said to be ten times the size of BBC Llandaff. Spin-off series The
Sarah Jane Adventures
was also made at Upper Boat and was due to transfer to Roath Lock but
following the sad death of Elizabeth Sladen in April 2011 the
decision was taken not to make any more. Early series of Torchwood
were also made at Upper Boat but the fourth series, Miracle Day,
was mostly filmed in the United States.

In
fact, Paul Middleton has pointed out that the new (Christopher
Eccleston) Dr Who first started at Sovereign House, an
industrial unit in Newport on the Imperial Park industrial
estate. That building was first rented by the BBC in 2001 to
house the BBC Wales drama series The Bench. The building
contained permanent sets of two law courts. The show was first
shown on BBC Wales but was intended to alternate with daytime soap Doctors
on BBC1. However, the production was axed after two series and Dr
Who occupied these 'studios' from 2003 before moving to Upper Boat.

With
Dr Who, Casualty, Pobol y Cwm
and other dramas such as Upstairs Downstairs being made here
too, it is not surprising that the centre has no less than 9 sound
stages of various shapes and sizes. Upstairs Downstairs
unfortunately was not recommissioned after its disappointing second
series which was made in these studios. However, Aliens vs Wizards
started filming in spring 2012.

Three
of the stages are occupied by Casualty, two by Pobol y Cwm
and the remaining four are used by 'transient' productions including Dr
Who.

The
stages here are called studios but apart from having flat TV floors
they have no technical facilities and very basic I-beam and scaffold
grids so I would prefer to describe them as stages. All are
different sizes but most are the same height except for studio 4
which is several feet higher.

The
dimensions wall to wall are approximately as follows: Studio
1: 175 x 75ft; studio 2: 100 x 60ft; studio 3 120 x
60ft; studio 4 140 x 80ft. These are the stages for Dr Who
and other dramas - the Tardis is a semi-permanent set at one end of
studio 4.

When
first built, studio 4 was fitted with a huge greenscreen which was
intended for Dr Who and any other drama that needed it.
It was said to be the largest in Europe. However, it was soon
realised that this big stage would be more productively employed
being used for large conventional sets - in particular those needing
a lot of height. A greenscreen is now fitted in the corner of
one of the other stages - large enough, but not the largest in Europe
any longer.

Studios
5 and 6 are both about 125 x 60ft. These are the Pobol y Cwm
stages and they have a basic truss and scaffold grid suspended over
the sets. The sets are mostly permanent - as are the lighting
rigs. Each stage has a small room on the studio floor in which
the LD sits along with a console op and racks engineer. This
show does not normally have a grade so it is essential that the
pictures as recorded are transmittable. The director sits at a
table on the studio floor with the PA and a couple of monitors.
The two cameras are both recorded onto hard drive and edited
later. There is no vision mixer - unlike when the series was
made in studio A in Llandaff.

Studios
7, 8 and 9 are dedicated to Casualty. Studio 7 is about
80ft square and has a hospital ward set in one half and the other
half is used for guest sets. Studio 8 is the most impressive on
the whole site. It is about 125 x 100 ft and contains a fully
ceilinged hospital set on two floors. Everything looks
completely believable - it is dressed and equipped as a real hospital
would be. There are soundproof barriers that can be used to
block doorways or corridors - this enables two units to be filming at
once within the stage. Cameras are Arri Alexas. Casualty
is shot single camera but occasionally a second one is used.

Studio
9 is the only non-soundproof stage and is used as the Ambulance
garage although guest sets are sometimes built within it. It is
about 75 x 50ft. Outside this stage and studio 8 are small
street scene exterior sets. On the other side of the road from
the hospital on the lot is a large pub set - this is used regularly
by Casualty but also sometimes by Pobol Y Cwm
- with a little bit of re-dressing it becomes a Welsh country
pub. Pobol also occasionally uses one of the Casualty
sets if it has a scene set in a hospital ward.

The
Roath Lock studios. The individual buildings are not all whole
stages - some also partly contain prop stores and workshops.

From
right to left - the top three buildings contain studios 1, 2
and 3. Then comes studio 4 - the largest and highest on the
site. This stage does fill the whole building. These four
are used by Dr Who
and other dramas when that show is not filming.

The
centre of the site is the Pobol y Cwm
base - studios 5 and 6 and the exterior street set in the
middle. The houses and shops are not just frontages - some
contain sets in which scenes are regularly shot.

The
left hand end of the site is for Casualty. Studio 7 is
within the next building and is used for guest sets. The large
building bottom left is studio 8 and where the main hospital set is
built. This is on two floors within it. The small
extension to this building bottom left is studio 9 and is the
Ambulance garage set.

Outside
the 'hospital' and the 'ambulance garage' are exterior street
sets. These are 15 miles apart in the story.

with
thanks to Googlemaps

Each
show has its own extensive prop store but every prop is recorded on
a database so is also available to the other shows that are made here
- or indeed to any other programme - at a reasonable price!
There is some cross-fertilisation of crew members too since most are
freelance but most tend to work on one series most of the time.

The
Crimewatch production office is located here although they
use the main studio at BBC Llandaff for their monthly
transmission. On the face of it an odd choice but Crimewatch
does of course film dramatic reconstructions of the crimes it covers
so they are able to draw upon local expertise for these.

The
BBC has committed to a 20 year lease costing £1.35m per
year. The construction cost was shared between the Welsh
government, Cardiff council and the development company, Igloo.
They also paid £10m up front to fit out the studios. In
July 2012 it was announced that the development had been awarded the
highest possible environmental and sustainability rating - and is the
first industrial building in the UK to obtain the prestigious BREEAM
Outstanding certificate. This has proved slightly
problematic. At first, the stages proved to be very hot to work
in as they were so well insulated and there was no conventional air
conditioning. Extra air handling ducts have had to be fitted to
some of them - and to the permanent Casualty set. These
still fit within the limitations of the BREEAM rules but have helped
to lower working temperatures.

In
some ways, these studios have taken the place of the old BBC
Film dept at Ealing Studios - but on a much bigger and more
sophisticated scale. The people working here seem genuinely
impressed with the facilities, including those on Casualty who
needed a lot of persuasion to move from Bristol. I have visited
the site and was very impressed with what I saw. Also, all the
reports I have read have been extremely positive. There is
little doubt that establishing this centre has been a success with
programmes not only benefiting from excellent facilities but able to
cross-fertilise experience and talent from one production to
another. This has had simple practical benefits too - for
example, a prosthetic baby made for Casualty was borrowed to
be used on Upstairs Downstairs. It's all beginning to
sound like the good old days at TV Centre!

Interestingly,
although the site was intended to be shared with independent
programme makers there is seldom room for them as the studios are
busy with BBC work most of the time. Even BBC programmes can't
fit in. The 2013 series of Sherlock was due to be made
here but because it clashed with the Dr Who schedule it was
made in the old Upper Boat studios. Good job they hadn't't gone
back to making seatbelts.

Despite
the fact that these studios were intended for single camera drama -
well, 2 cameras in the case of Pobol y Cwm - the first
multicamera entertainment show was recorded here in November
2013. It was Only Connect, the very popular (in my
household at least) quiz show hosted by Victoria Coren-Mitchell.
Previously recorded in Studio 1 Culverhouse Cross, it moved here for
reasons currently unknown but since that studio is due to close soon
we can assume that Roath Lock will be its new regular home. An
OB truck was used for facilities.

Good
luck to all those who work here. Nice to hear a genuine success story.

Blackstaff
- Belfast

In
1989 the BBC announced plans to develop Blackstaff near
Broadcasting House in Belfast into a 6,500 sqft studio with work
starting in February 1990. The facility also with accommodation
for production departments and support staff was completed by the end
of 1991 and replaced ageing facilities at Balmoral Hall.
Development costs were kept down by purchasing second hand lighting,
mechanical equipment and audience seating. Further cost savings
were made as dedicated control rooms were not built (apart from a
lighting gallery), with technical facilities provided by an OB
vehicle when required.

the
Blackstaff studio - on a very wide lens!

thanks
to Peter Jones

When
it originally opened the Type 6 OB in operation was equipped with
Thomson 1531 and 1624 cameras, although the portable tube cameras
were were replaced by 1647 CCD cameras around 1992. These
cameras were all replaced in the OB unit around 1997 by widescreen
capable 1657 camera heads.

Later
the same OB scanner was equipped entirely with widescreen digital
technology including Thomson/Philips LDK200 cameras, a 32-input DD30
vision mixer and 36-channel sound mixer. It was the principal
unit used to provide technical and control room facilities for the
studio. In late 2011 this scanner was replaced with a
refurbished one with HD facilities. 10 Sony 1500R cameras are available.

Blackstaff
is the home of many locally transmitted shows such as Nolan Liveand
the Blackstaff Sessions. It has also been used to make
several UK network programmmes includingPatrick
Kielty Almost Live, Frank Skinner's Opinionated, Ask Rhod GilbertandQuestion
Time. It has retractable audience seating for 290.A new floor was laid in 2011.

I
would appreciate any more info on other programmes made for network
TV. The studio may well get further network use with the
increase in programmes commissioned by 'The Nations' under the
new BBC scheme of things.

In
Broadcasting House, Ormeau Avenue, the BBC also have studio B - a
2,000 sq ft studio used for local news, current affairs and sport,
and studio C - a small unattended studio with a single camera.
Studio One is an old radio concert studio across the road from BH and
has been used for a few programmes including Sunday Morning Live
and Sesame Tree. There is also a small studio in the
parliament building at Stormont.

thanks
to Mike Emery for much of the above technical info.

Pacific
Quay - Glasgow

Pacific
Quay, formerly known as Prince's Dock, formed an important part of
Glasgow's once thriving industrial docklands, being the first dock in
the city to install the full range of cranes capable of lifting the
heavy engines and boilers so important in establishing Glasgow's
industrial influence across the world. The cargo docks existed
for more than 100 years before closing in the 1970s. The site
was subsequently chosen for the Glasgow Garden Festival in 1988 but
when that closed it remained largely redundant until its rebirth as
Pacific Quay in the early 1990s. It covers 28 hectares and
comprises a 500,000 square feet mixed-use development incorporating
offices, residential, hotel, leisure and other supporting
businesses. The 10-acre Festival Park, to the south of the new
development area, remains as a permanent reminder of the success of
the flower festival.

The
BBC's new HQ is a glass-fronted rectangular block, six stories
high. (Confusingly, actually five plus a mezzanine floor.)
The building is clad with a triple-glazed system, which I have read
provides a natural air-conditioning system. The interior of the
building is far more interesting than the somewhat bland
exterior. Within the structure is a huge staircase, known as
the 'street', that rises throughout the entire length of the design,
housing the studios underneath and providing break-out spaces and
informal meeting areas on top. This is clearly what the
architect was mostly interested in when he sat down with his blank
sheet of paper, so to speak.

Making
one's way from the studio to the cafeteria which is on the top floor
is therefore not quite as straightforward as it is in most studio
centres. To be fair, there are of course lifts to the top floor
although the complicated security pass system does mean that you
might get trapped the wrong side of the door if you're not careful.

The
'street'. This photo was taken on the first floor (actually
the second floor as the first floor is called the 'mezzanine') so it
doesn't show the entire height.

The
interior reminds me of the turbine hall in Tate Modern - it's on a
similar scale. However, instead of a huge spider or giant
trumpet, there is a massive staircase rising from the entrance on the
ground floor to the cafeteria on the sixth. Or fifth, as it
says in the lifts.

The
materials were apparently chosen to represent the history of the
area - I'm told that the sandstone is the same as was used for the
old dockside tenement buildings, the chromed metal represents the
local ship building yards and the grey concrete blocks represent
something else I've forgotten. Sorry.

The
view from the top level. Extraordinary.

The
offices on each floor open out with no fire doors or other barriers
to be seen.

I
gather that initially there were rules about what could be left on
desks so the place didn't look untidy but from what I have seen, that
rule has quite sensibly already been quietly forgotten.

It's
not only BBC Scotland that has moved to this area - Scottish
Television (formally SMG), the company that provides the ITV service
to Scotland, is also based at Pacific Quay next door but two to the
Corporation's building. However, STV have no production studios
in their complex, just small news studios. They vacated their
central Glasgow studio centre which included a 6,200 sq ft
studio but decided that it was not cost-effective to replace it.
That old Scottish Television studio had opened in 1974 and was
demolished in 2007 shortly after STV moved here. It does on
reflection seem extraordinary that a nation with such a strong sense
of identity as Scotland should have not even one large independent
production TV studio to make programmes for its own market.

Just
a quick note to record that from 1957 when they were created,
Scottish Television occupied the Theatre Royal in Hope Street, which
they used as a studio. Some of the programmes made there were
also shown south of the border. In 1974 they moved next door to
new purpose-built studios, which in turn were demolished in 2007, as
mentioned above. The theatre was then purchased by Scottish Opera.

I'm
told by Leigh Mulpeter that...

'...The
rear of the domed ceiling still opens up to reveal a second FOH
lighting position put in place for the studio work. This,
when I last toured there, still had the Strand Patt 793 2Kw profiles
in place as they were far too big and heavy for the crew to manhandle
out of the roof space. The roof opening is operated by a still
beautifully intact and operational wooden block and pulley system
with some very old counterweights.'

Well
fancy that.

Since
STV no longer have any studios, the BBC are hoping that they will
book studio space in their building from time to time as well as
independent production companies. This is not such a strange
idea - programmes were made at BBC TV Centre in London for ITV and C4
for many years. In fact one or two shows have indeed been made
here for STV but sadly not anything like the number that ought to be
if STV took their responsibilities to the Scottish nation
seriously. Why isn't there a regular Scots gameshow or quiz
show, some music shows and a sitcom or two with Scottish scripts and
actors? If they were well made they would pull in the ratings
and generate advertising revenue and some of these shows could be
shown over the UK ITV network too. That's what STV should be
doing in Scotland - as should the BBC of course. (end of rant number
1.) OK - STV are now making one quiz show - Postcode Challenge
- in studio B at PQ. It's a start.

I
have been told a story that cannot possibly be true. As
everyone knows, PQ was designed as a 'tapeless' studio centre.
Except of course, until very recently it wasn't and all programmes
made in studio A were mostly been recorded on videotape like in every
other studio. It seems that early in its existence, a runner
was sent to deliver the day's recorded tapes to the STV building
'next door' where they were going to be edited. She duly handed
them into reception and went home. Next day there was a flap on
as STV hadn't received the tapes. It seems that the runner had
obeyed her instructions to the letter. Unfortunately, the
building literally next door was occupied by the Scottish
judiciary. STV was next door but one. The gameshow tapes
had been taken in and included as evidence in an on-going legal case
and could not now be released without permission from the judge,
which would take several weeks to obtain. I have yet to
establish whether the runner was employed again. More likely
she was promoted and is now a producer of a Saturday night talent show.

The
BBC's building here contains three studios, of which one is is
relatively large - at something over 8,000 sq ft. It is 90 x 70
metric feet within firelanes so pretty well identical in size to
studios TC3, TC4, TC6 and TC8 at TV Centre. One might think it
was booked solid making shows for Scotland - to be shown on BBC1
Scotland and STV but sadly this isn't the case. The way British
TV is organised, the good people of Scotland mostly have to watch the
same as the rest of the UK. No wonder so many Scots want independence.

Studio
A. 90 x 70ft but with loads of elbow room. The firelanes
are the widest I've ever seen at about 8 feet! Note the storage
area at the end of the studio for the mobile audience seating.
When this is in use that area is available for props storage.
The studio also has two scene dock doors and a large scenery/props
store with easy access to outdoors and lots of space for vehicles to
load/unload. All this compares very favourably with the studios
at MediaCity in Salford, which were built around the same time.
The only serious drawback of the studio's design is that the control
rooms are at gantry level (from which this photo was taken), not on
the ground floor.

The
main studio - studio A - is in fact occupied for much of the time
with programmes being made for the UK versions of BBC1 or BBC2.
Since opening in the summer of 2007, several shows have been brought
to the studio that might otherwise have been made in London.
These have included Get 100 and Copycats (CBBC
gameshows), The National Lottery 1 vs 100, Who Dares Wins
and In It To Win It, daytime gameshow A Question of Genius,
sitcoms
The Old Guys, Life of Riley and
Mrs Brown's Boys and song and dance show
Tonight's the Night. Almost
all of these had the production teams, director, actors/presenters
and various heads of craft departments flown up from London.

I am
very pleased to report that the studio staff are very friendly and
helpful to those who travel up to work with them - I'm not sure I
would be in the circumstances. The local staffers must find it
a bit galling to have a bunch of Englishmen coming up to tell them
how to do things that they probably consider they are quite capable
of doing themselves but they certainly don't show it and could not be
more accommodating.

Studio
B is much smaller - smaller than TC2, say, at TV Centre. In
2008/9 it was decided that daytime shows The Weakest Link and Eggheads
would also move to Scotland and be made in this studio. Weakest
Link was being made in a large studio in Pinewood and was
completely unsuitable to be transferred to such a small room.
However, despite the size of the Scottish studio being marked out on
the floor of TV-One at Pinewood so all could appreciate the problem,
certain BBC managers and producers apparently insisted that it would
have to be made to fit. After several months of discussions it
was eventually decided to make the show in Studio A at PQ. Eggheads,
however, was made to fit in Studio B. By chance, the set could
just about squeeze into the tiny space with a little trimming but the
'question room' - previously an area just behind the set in the same
studio - literally had to become another room in the building.
Another daytime quiz show - Perfection - has also made the
move to Glasgow and squeezed into studio B.

The
BBC is plainly keen to see these studios used as much as possible and
to try to get more programmes made outside London. However, I'm
not sure that making a couple of sitcoms in Glasgow that from their
scripts are plainly supposed to be set in the south-east of England
is quite the way to achieve that. Similarly, I wonder if making
existing gameshows in Glasgow that have worked well in London is
really helping to promote Scottish culture and identity throughout
the UK. I wonder how many Scots even realise that these shows
are now 'Scottish?' Nevertheless, in October 2008 Jana Bennett
(Director, BBC Vision) announced that...

'...Network
spend [in Scotland] is planned to at least meet the population level
by 2016, increasing from 3.3% currently to around 9%.'

She added...

'...We
will double the amount of comedy from the Nations by
2012....Scotland will focus on five genres, in all of which it
already has great strengths  and those are Children's, Comedy,
Entertainment, Drama and Factual.'

I
wonder, is it possible to 'focus' on quite so many areas of TV -
that's almost all of it isn't it? Oh yes - I almost forgot the
Arts. But Newsnight Review (later called The Review Show)
and Alan Yentob's Imagine moved here too. Anyway, there
was more...

'...Scotland's
in-house Entertainment business will be reinforced by the move of
key returning strands. We will be making at least one Saturday night
Lottery show in Pacific Quay as well as one from the independent
sector. To bolster the in-house entertainment department we are
planning to move Weakest Link to Scotland.'

Anne
Robinson's reaction to the move was not recorded. Jana Bennet continued...

'...Question
Time, one of the BBC's leading political programmes, will be
based in Scotland from 2010. We are planning to commission a
National Lottery show from an independent in Scotland in addition to
one made in-house.'

Now,
pretty obviously Question Time is a show that travels the
country so will not be made in these studios - except perhaps when
the show visits Glasgow. As for the Lotto shows - it seems the
intention now is that almost all the BBC's lottery shows will
be made here.

What
does seem odd and downright wasteful to many is that so many shows
are being made in these studios that were previously made in London -
but without any obvious benefit to Scotland or indeed to the
BBC. It must be costing far more, since so many of the key
people involved are travelling up here from their homes around London
and being put up in hotels for the duration. The hired lighting
equipment too has to be trucked all the way up the country and back
again. Local BBC staff cameramen, sound crews, make-up and
wardrobe assistants, electricians and scene shifters are of course
employed on the shows - which is nice for them but tough on the
freelance crews from all over the rest of the UK who originally
worked on them.

It's
easy to be cynical about these things but in principal the BBC is
trying to do the right thing. It can't seem right to many
people all over the UK that so much of the country's television seems
to be focused on London. However, the essential problem will
not go away - as has been discovered time and again; most writers and
performers working in the worlds of theatre, comedy, music, film and
television tend to gravitate towards London, wherever they were born
and brought up. London is arguably the cultural capital of the
world, not just the UK. There will of course always be
individuals who fight that urge and decide to work in their local
town or city but for most creative people the magnetic force of
London cannot be resisted any more than people in similar professions
in the US gravitate to Hollywood or New York.

That
applies too to producers, studio directors and the various craft
departments - set design, lighting, sound, cameras, vision mixing,
costume, make-up, graphics, visual effects and so on - it's simply
because they work on so many shows of all types that they learn how
to do their jobs and are able to work quickly and efficiently to
world-class standards. If all that is fragmented then arguably
the industry as a whole will suffer.

My
guess (and I promise that this rant will be over soon) is that the
important thing to most viewers is who the people are that they are
watching on their TVs - and where the programme appears to be set -
not where the programme has actually been made. The
Liver Birds and
Bread had
a few locations filmed in Liverpool but the majority of the running
time was shot at TV Centre in London.
So
what?Those comedies could not have been more Liverpudlian.
Two Pints of Lager was firmly set in Runcorn with a northern
cast but apart from a few location scenes it too was recorded at TV
Centre. Does that matter? Surely what really matters is
that the culture of people who are not from the south-east of England
is properly represented.

Rant
over.

Anyway
- back to the studios. As previously mentioned, there are
three - A, B and C. A is about 8,400 sq ft (90ft x 70ft within
firelanes), B is 2,600 sq ft (53.3ft x 37ft within firelanes) and C
is just under 2,000 sq ft. (The 'within firelanes' measurements
are metric feet - i.e. 30cm.)

Only
A and C have fully equipped galleries. B is basically a
four-waller and uses an OB scanner as a production gallery although
it does have a lighting and vision gallery. C is used for local
news and sport and A, as mentioned, mostly for entertainment and
comedy shows. A is equipped with eight Sony HDC-1500 high def
cameras and C with five. The studios were designed to be
'tapeless' - in other words, all material would be recorded straight
onto hard drives where it could easily be edited. However, for
the first few years of use all shows recorded onto tape and
disc-based recording only started in 2012.

The
galleries in A are large and well laid-out, although perversely
located at upper gantry level rather than at ground level which would
have made much more sense. The walk to and from the studio
floor is thus longer than in any other studio I know of - apart from
the new ones at MediaCity in Salford which are even further
away. Who has been telling the architects of these new studios
that we'd like to be as far away from the studio floor as possible
please? I'd like to meet him!!!

At
first glance, studio A appears to be almost a carbon copy of studios
TC3 or TC4 at TV Centre. It is almost exactly the same size and
has widely-spaced long lighting bars so looks very similar. I
suppose this is a compliment to the team who built TV Centre 50 years
ago. Even now, the basic design can't be improved upon.

Lighting
here is controlled by a very sophisticated data network, which as
originally planned enabled 64 universes to control the three studios,
presentation, reception and local areas. Thus it is possible
for a show using any gallery to control the lighting in any other
studio as well as its own. If that sounds a bit scary to you
you're quite right. I've been working there on and off since
2008 and the local data system can occasionally be very scary indeed!

The
lights are suspended from long motorised bars in A rather than
monopoles (which is a bit of a shame if you ask me) and are
controlled by ETC Congo desks. The dimmers are on the lighting
bars, rather than in a separate dimmer room so access for fault
finding or resetting trips can be difficult. Everything is
linked to the very complex data network which can make even the
simplest thing - like feeding a socket with mains - rather
time-consuming and occasionally prone to network faults. I
detect the influence of 'consultants' who, let's be honest, have very
little experience of actually making a television programme.

The
lighting and scenery hoists are controlled by a complex computerised
panel which reassuringly has two buttons to actually control the
motion. These were clearly manufactured specifically for this
studio. See below...

Studio
B has a basic scaffold grid with bars about 3ft 6ins apart.
Rigging is via step ladders and scissor lifts. (No quick
relights in here then!) There is a mix of new lights and the
Colortran dual sources from the old BBC Glasgow studios.

Access
to studio A is via two scene dock doors with clear access to the
outside world for loading/unloading and there is plenty of space for
storage. This aspect of the building's design is
excellent. (Interesting to compare these studios in this
respect with the new ones in Salford.)

There
is no doubt that these are mostly well designed studios and have
benefitted from a great deal of input from the BBC staff who moved
from the old studios in Queen Margaret Drive. In the words of
Joe Breslin - staff LD at the time - "I aimed high, asked for
everything, and got about 70%" Good for him, I say.
At least they bothered to ask him.

So
these excellent studios will no doubt be made to succeed - they
can't be allowed to fail. I genuinely wish them every
success. What I would truly like to see however are plenty of
shows made here by the Scots for Scotland. It would also be
good if some of them were shown on UK network TV too - but they
should be 'Scottish' shows, not London shows brought up to occupy the
studio in order to artificially satisfy a quota.

BBC
Dumbarton Studios

Above
and below - the BBC Dumbarton site. Top left is the external
set for River City. The internal sets are in the centre
block below. The one to its left is studio 1 - which is
available for general hire. Studio 2 is the lower of the larger
buildings top right, the other is a workshop.

Although
unknown to most people living south of the border, River City
is a very popular soap in Scotland. It has been made by the BBC
since 2002 and is based in studios that are a converted whisky
bottling plant in Dumbarton, on the north west outskirts of
Glasgow. The site has three main stages converted from
industrial buildings. One is permanently occupied with the sets
for River City and the other two (studios 1 and 2) are
available for hire. There is also a back lot with a permanent
street scene set. The site has workshops and all the usual
facilities - make-up, wardrobe, dressing rooms, production offices etc.

In
2008 two stages were made available for use by other
productions. Studio 1 is 170 x 104ft and studio 2 is 197 x
147ft. Both have relatively low roofs of only 16-22ft as you
might expect from converted industrial sheds. Studio 1 is an
unbroken space but studio 2 has two rows of pillars within it,
suppporting the roof. Stage 1 has been acoustically treated and
both stages have a 3-phase power supply. Neither stage has a
lighting grid.

Above
- studio 1; below - studio 2

with
thanks to the BBC Dumbarton website

There
are no technical facilities - River City is shot using single
camera technique (although 2 cameras are often in use.) The two
other stages are just basic 4-wallers. They have been used for
a number of dramas and films but Channel 4 daytime quiz show Face
the Clock, hosted by Rory Bremner was also recorded in studio 1
in the autumn of 2012. Fly-away facilities and cameras
were hired in. I'm told that the greatest problem during
recordings was preventing the contestants from looking freezing cold
on camera.

Since
2008 Dumbarton has been used for a number of dramas including Garrow's
Law, The Deep, Hope Springs, Personal Affairs, Eagle of the Ninth and
How Not to Live Your Life.

Copyright
information: As on the rest of this website - please do not
use or ask permission to use any of these images in books or other
publications or on TV programmes or commercially run websites.
Many of the illustrations are copyrighted by their respective
copyright holders according to the original copyright or publication
date as printed on the artwork or publication and are reproduced here
for historical reference and research purposes. If you do own
the copyright to any image displayed here and wish it to be credited
or removed, please contact me and I shall of course be happy to oblige.